2019 High School Winners

Pitt Pongpittayapa and Kritin Vongthongsri are in the eleventh grade at Bangkok Christian College, Ruamrudee International School in Bangkok, Thailand. They discovered the World of 7 Billion contest when looking for youth competitions online and immediately knew that Sustainable Resource Use was the right category for them. Kritin says, “people really need to see the importance of finding ways to preserve our resources and use them as efficiently as possible.” Nanotechnology was an easy choice of subject: Kritin has presented his research on silver nanoparticles at a conference at Oxford University.

Pitt loves filmmaking and was excited to explore one of his favorite hobbies through a new lens, but Kritin had never made any videos prior to their submission. They say that the most challenging part of the process was figuring out how to adapt the content of their video so that anybody could understand while still keeping everything under one minute. Despite the challenges, making a video on a topic they’re passionate about made everything that much easier. They advise future participants to focus on ideas that they really value and to never give up on making their videos the best they can possibly be.

Pitt explores his interest in filmmaking by making his own videos and posting them to his successful Youtube, Instagram, and Facebook accounts, where he has amassed thousands of followers. He also loves basketball and has won several awards with his school’s team, and enjoys music by playing the drums and beatboxing. Pitt lives with his parents, sisters, grannies, aunts, uncles, and cousins in a “big and crazy house.” If he could choose a superpower, he would choose super speed, because “so much could be done in the blink of an eye.” Kritin loves classical music and has won awards for playing the piano and saxophone. He wants to study biomedical engineering at Stanford University and plans to use his prize money through an NGO that he has started called Eyesaver, which aims to bring proper vision care to children all across Thailand. He cites his parents as the biggest influence on his life, with his father the bedrock of the family and a mother who has always pushed herself to the limits on his behalf. Without them, Kritin says, there “would have never been today.”