50 episodes listed below
Founders and students on money, work and fair chances.
The Tomato Timer, a ZNotes pomcast, has Zubair talking with founders and students, several of them people from his own circles. Budgeting and credit, coding courses for refugees, university access and a university with no exams all come up, and the conversations often close on one plain piece of advice.
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The Tomato Timer is filed under study skills, but in its recent episodes learning means something wider than exam technique. It is a ZNotes pomcast with one guest at a time and Zubair asking the questions. Several of those guests come from his own circles. Victor Neumann is a Sigma Squared fellow alongside him. James Frater is a fellow DIA award recipient who works with him on the EY Foundation's Youth Advisory Board, and Charlie Rogers is introduced as a friend. The openings are direct. Zubair asks Victor right away why financial education is still a problem, and he tells James that the first question will be a hard one. The money conversation is the most hands-on of the set. Victor, founder of Invested, walks through core competencies that he says the EU and the German government define: income and expenses, insurance, the stock market and saving for later, budgeting, credit and debt. Priya Burci is COO of the mental health app AIM and was previously CEO of Power Coders, which runs coding courses and tech job placements for refugees. She names unequal access to opportunity as the social problem closest to her heart. She traces it to a grandfather who was the first person in his village to be educated and who went on to build a career at the UN. James, a medical student at Imperial College London and co-founder of Ladder Project CIC, describes how one university has brought in people with different expertise to support Black Caribbean students, Gypsy, Roma and Traveller students, and students with insecure immigration status. Work gets its own hearing. Charlie Rogers, who is writing about mastering your 20s, talks through flexible hours and whether work can mean more than a paycheck, while granting that not everyone wants it to. Zubair asks Harry Beard, co-founder of the youth design competition Prospect 100, about the importance of design in everyday life, down to the feel of a phone. The episode closest to the study-skills label may be 'Global Living with a Minerva Student ft. Dinara Bach | The Tomato Timer #056'. Dinara describes a university based on the science of learning. It has no lectures, tests or exams, gives plenty of written assignments, and moves students to a new country every semester. Zubair is an enthusiastic interviewer who uses words like 'amazing' and 'powerful' freely, and he sometimes answers a guest with his own experience. Several conversations close on a single piece of advice: do not be too hard on yourself, ask for help even when it feels like a submissive position, get uncomfortable every day. For something practical, start with 'Managing Your Money ft. Victor Neumann | The Tomato Timer #069'. For the argument that privilege should be used to open doors for others, start with Priya Burci.
Made for: Suits a listener who likes friendly one-guest interviews with founders and students and wants practical footing on money, work and access to education.
What sets it apart: Its idea of learning is broad, taking in financial literacy, university access and a university with no exams. Several guests come from Zubair's own network, so the interviews play as conversations between peers.
Hi and welcome to The Tomato Timer, a pomcast about learning to learn. I’m Zubair from ZNotes and I’m tuning in live with experts around the world, asking your questions and hearing their stories, all before the tomato goes off. 24 minutes and 49 seconds to go.
From budgeting basics to university access, Zubair asks what you were left to figure out yourself.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
A grounded conversation about using entrepreneurship to widen access to opportunity.
Entrepreneurship is framed here as a practical path toward social impact. Priya Burci, COO of AIM and previously CEO of Power Coders, links that view to her political science background and her work at Flowminder, where anonymized mobile data and satellite imagery informed…
A clear, grounded conversation about academic barriers and the everyday value of asking for help.
Representation here is framed less as a slogan than as a question of design: how educational systems are built, who understands their rules, and who feels entitled to challenge them.
Harry Beard connects Prospect 100's lockdown origins with the everyday value of design and creative work.
Harry Beard frames Prospect 100 as a practical response to lockdown, started with friends he had met online and aimed at giving young designers a useful way forward.
Charlie Rogers frames self-mastery in the twenties as a practice built through meditation, mindset, and healthier work boundaries.
The Tomato Timer's 65th episode treats mastering your 20s less as a race through milestones than as an ongoing practice of self-management. Charlie Rogers, presented as an entrepreneur, athlete, and creator, connects daily meditation with a wider attempt to bring the mind, work,…
Smarter revision for high-stakes exam seasons.
Study smarter without disappearing into coursework.
Practical school guidance for Victorian families.
Life lessons for students, one guest at a time.
A memory champion thinks out loud, one image at a time.
Victor Newman ends with two practical rules for young listeners: check who is sending personal-finance content and talk about money with friends and parents.
Priya Burci says entrepreneurship, not bureaucracy, was the most direct way she could create impact, and she backs that up with a Flowminder-to-Power Coders path.
The Tomato Timer #067 centers on James Freider, an award-winning Caribbean medical student at Imperial College London and co-founder of Ladder Project CIC, talking about representation and education inequality.
The Tomato Timer - a ZNotes Pomcast speaks with Harry Beard, co-founder of Prospect 100, about a youth design competition platform built during lockdown and now run with brands like Swatch and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
The Tomato Timer #065 brings Charlie Rogers on to talk about mastering your 20s through meditation, attention management, and work design.
At 18, Natalia Knipše used Latvia’s youth parliament role to secure meetings with MPs and the president.
On The Tomato Timer, Melissa Wright Katongola connects her law and politics studies with her work as a painter, model, singer, and actress.
Ayan Said founded Voicing Voices to bring marginalized people's experiences into decision-making and policy development.
Diana Chao, founder of Letters to Strangers, tells The Tomato Timer host that she was diagnosed with bipolar disorder at 13 and began writing letters to strangers after surviving a series of suicide attempts.
Alex Anderson says he went through four schools between ages seven and nine because he was labelled "a naughty child" before his Asperger diagnosis, then flourished at John Frost High School's specialist autism base.
Luke Kavanaugh, who co-founded the Steer think tank (50+ volunteers, 33 countries), says that "politics isn't just electoral politics" and that being involved does not mean taking a party stance.
Host Zubair interviews Dinara about her experience at Minerva University, a radically innovative program with no lectures or exams, and discusses learning strategies and global living.
Host Zubair interviews his friend Abdullah about their educational journeys and career paths, reflecting on expectations versus reality.
An interview with the co-founder of Changemakers discussing her journey and work towards gender equality.
Host Zubair interviews two Cambridge law graduates about their journey to studying law and their free e-book for law students.
Host Zubair interviews Ali, a doctor and YouTuber, about his journey through GCSEs and A-levels and his approach to learning.
Host Zubair interviews a rocket scientist about her journey from Formula One passion to a career in space and automotive industries, exploring learning and career development.
Host Zubair interviews Charlotte, a digital technology apprentice, about her first job and how it built her confidence, tying into broader themes of learning and growth.
Host Zubair interviews architect-turned-business director Joanna Wairoba about her career journey and what it means to succeed in personal, client, and company areas.