Ryan Collins, who wrote a white paper on ISLcoin, and cryptocurrency club leader Antonio Del Rio ISL

Ryan Collins, who wrote a white paper on ISLcoin, and cryptocurrency club leader Antonio Del Rio ISL

ISLcoin, which will go live on 28 June, was created by members of the cryptocurrency club, a group of students aged from 14 to 17 who have been meeting every Thursday since November 2017 to learn about blockchain capabilities and different cryptocurrencies.

“The main things we were looking at were coin for transactions for the business club. Because the club has a store where they sell merchandise, we wanted to create a cryptocurrency that could be used for their transactions,” cryptocurrency club leader Antonio Del Rio told Delano.

Two coders from the group, Himanshu Pathak and David Lawyer, set out to create the coin using the Rinkeby test platform on the Ethereum network to reduce costs and maximise transaction speeds. “While people were coding, the rest of us were learning more about cryptocurrencies and also the possibility of dealing with our own cryptocurrency,” Ryan Collins said, explaining that the infrastructure can be used for more than just transactions--it can also be used as a reliable tool for voting, authenticating school documents and sharing encrypted files.

Photo: ISL. ISL cryptocurrency club advisor James Mulli explains cryptocurrencies to students

Club members hope students will use the coin to buy things, with each ISLcoin is worth 10 euro cents, and the number of coins issued capped at 1 million. Initially, they plan to give away free coins to get the project started and they will offer discounts on merchandise in the business club store to encourage its use.

Eventually, they will encourage fellow students to validate transactions through a third-party application, for which they will be rewarded in ISLcoin, a practice known as “mining”.

“It’s just amazing to try to understand this brand-new technology. This is very fast and it’s great we’re one of the first to go forward with this technology to take it to school level,” Antonio said.

The club will lose Ryan and Himanshu at the end of the summer as they embark on their university careers. Remaining members will, however, supported by an advisory council, comprised of senior figures in multinational firms, who will help ensure the future of ISLcoin.