Sharp answering students’ questions during his visit to York Suburban Senior High School. Photo taken by Gordon Freirich.
Evan Sharp, graduate of York Suburban Senior High School in 2001 and cofounder of Pinterest, returned to speak to the art and business students on October 20.
Pinterest is a free mobile application and website in which users discover new products, ideas, and easier methods to hard tasks. Users “pin” these pages and websites to their collections, better known as “boards.” Sharp was previously employed by Facebook, and was simply working on Pinterest as a side project with his partner, Ben Silbermann.
The leap from Facebook to Pinterest was a dangerous one, because Pinterest was not yet popular, but it was a risk that Sharp was willing to take. Although Facebook was becoming a large success and it made no sense to move to Pinterest, he took this risk because he loved working on Pinterest and the future potential of Pinterest as well.
“I was kind of in love with it….emotionally, it’s where my heart was. So, I did it anyway, and we got very lucky”, Sharp said about the change to Pinterest. Sharp and his partner did not believe that Pinterest would become such a great success: “We didn’t think it was going to be a big thing at all…It’s kind of cool that it worked out that way, but it wasn’t planned.”
Sharp takes a lot of pride in his work within the Pinterest company and said that it is going to continue to evolve. Pinterest is going to become increasingly more popular globally and nationally.
As more users utilize the website or app, more employees are needed and different technology is needed to be updated. Sharp believes that the Pinterest company’s role is to help channel the energies that drive its users and to spark creativity within them.
He said that creativity is key, and that if people can explore creativity rather than following fate, they will truly be happy. He and his partner aim to make more people around the world recognize their creative and the possibilities of life that are available. Sharp said, “Discovery means, pretty simply, helping understand what’s out there, what’s possible for you in a way that wouldn’t be possible without the service”.
Art and business students drilled Sharp with questions for an entire class period. Senior Jillian Carlisle, asked, “Will you follow me on Pinterest?” In response, Sharp said, “Sure!” After the question and answer session came to a conclusion, many students approached Sharp to gain his follow on Pinterest and to capture a photo next to him.
Senior, Cierra Niedererr shared her thoughts on Sharp’s visit: “I thought it was really cool to talk to someone that was your everyday teenager like us that grew up to be so successful. I especially liked how he went to school for things completely different than what he ended up doing…”
Another senior, Kendall Lenhert, also gave her thoughts on the question and answer session: “It was very inspiring that a kid that was once walking this halls is now a millionaire and everyone knows his name.”