by Robert

On the one hand, I admire families full of creative, entrepreneurial people—even more so when the real creative dreamers and doers are the kids. When the real teachers are the kids.

On the other hand: when kids teach kids, bad things happen. That’s, like, a maxim, an accepted truth, yes? I think FOX made a shockumentary about it:

Tune in at 8 tonight for the wildest episode yet of When Animals Attack! … and then, stayed tuned at 9 for a taste of small-town apocalypse: When Kids Teach Kids!!!

But, turns out, there’s an exception to every rule. And so I give you (via the New York Times) Zach and Sophie, the Galant siblings of suburban Dallas, TX.

About five years ago, at age 14, Zach Galant began a video game camp for 3rd to 8th graders, for the purpose of teaching them how to play (or better play) their video games. Seriously. His specific goal was to teach them “how to add things, how to make your people move and how to create enemies, collectibles and powers-ups.”

He ran the camp, Camp Tera Byte, for two years out of his school’s computer lab, paying the school a percentage of the camp’s earnings—until 2006, that is, when he realized that he could be his business’ sole owner if he moved his operation into his parents’ garage.

So he went out and bought 13 computers and did just that: he set up shop in their garage, and just this past summer, at age 19, before the fall semester of his freshman year at Stanford, his five one-week sessions with 90 kids, using 20 computers, and employing five counselors brought him $36,000 (the kids having been charged just under $400 each).

That’s quite an accomplishment to be spearheaded by a teenager—14 years old when he got the thing seriously started. Wow, kudos! But, can you just imagine if all that entrepreneurial spirit had been focused on something that actually mattered, instead of video games? Enter Sophie, Zach’s younger sister…

At the tender age of 12, Sophie began a day camp of her very own…
Creative Arts Camp is a camp for girls which Sophie Galant runs out of the family’s home, and costs $600 for two weeks, with an additional $50 for materials. But Sophie quickly realized not all of the girls (who might’ve wanted to attend) could not afford that—so she set up a separate, non-profit camp at another facility she managed to borrow.

Her free camp (which she gave the rather swimming name “Kids Teach Kids”) is for underprivileged 7-12 year-old girls; these young ladies sing, dance, write poetry, cook, make costumes, and paint scenery, all of which is showcased in a special performance for their families and friends at the end of the week.

Sophie enlists the assistance of other high school students like herself for both of her camps, as counselors, and the ones at the home-based, for-profit camp receive $8/hr for their time and efforts, while the non-profit camp counselors are in it for the experience, having it go toward community service hours. Buses bring these counselors to and from the camps, and lunches, snacks, and materials are covered by bake sales, art shows, and solicitations.

And since running two camps while attending high school is, apparently, not enough, Sophie is already on the verge of opening her 3rd camp, where, during 3 one-week sessions, creative arts will be combined with immersion in foreign languages, paralleling and building off things Sophie, herself, is studying…

Zach and Sophie Galant: two shining examples of creative thinking and entrepreneurial brio, who created their own home-based businesses while never forgetting about the importance of education, even incorporating it into each of their summer camps. While Zach’s camp is mainly about getting better and better at playing your video games, there is a bit of a boom going on with video game technology and courses being offered in creating your very own video games—so, potentially, several kids that Zach camp-teaches could find his way into creating his own video game and go on to teach a whole new bunch of kids how to play it and get better at it…

And Sophie’s camps are all about creative self-expression and are strongly education-based. She’s teaching other girls about things she’s learning and/or is interested in. And, in conjunction with that process, she’s actively seeking out other new skills and avenues of knowledge, so that she may better herself while trying to help better others.