Two computer science student teams won funding for their innovative business plans at this year’s HopStart: Hopkins New Venture Challenge. Hosted by the Center for Leadership Education, the annual competition provides students with business plan development experience and valuable mentorship and networking opportunities with industry leaders.
HopStart 2023 saw 125 teams compete, with only 35 making it to the final rounds; their pitches were evaluated and judged by 23 industry professionals and venture capitalists on Friday, April 28. Two CS student-led ventures each won third place in the two General Ventures categories. Read more about their products below.
Edinn
K-12 teachers are experiencing burnout at increasing rates—they have too much to do and not enough time to do it. CS undergraduates Xinan Rahman (BS ’25) and Sean Pak (BS ’24), in collaboration with alumnus Matt Liu (BS ’22) and master’s in engineering management student Max Guo (MS ’23), present a solution: an AI-powered curriculum creation platform called Edinn.
The Edinn team (L-R): Sean Pak, Xinan Rahman, Matt Liu, and Max Guo.
It’s estimated that U.S. teachers spend an average of 12 hours a week searching for instructional resources and planning lessons; Edinn can not only reduce that time, but also integrates generated lesson plans with existing learning management systems and enables collaboration with other teachers, all while producing content far superior to that generated by the likes of ChatGPT.
With the funding secured from their HopStart winnings and their $2500 cohort prize from the FastForward U Spark Accelerator, the Edinn team plans to incorporate their venture and accelerate additional feature development.
“Our team is incredibly grateful for the support we’ve received from HopStart, FastForward U, and our advisors,” they state, thanking Professor Ali Madooei in particular. “Currently, we are beta testing our product with a public high school in New York, and have plans to conduct additional pilot tests with K-12 schools over the next few months.”
CommUnity
There is a significant disconnect between college students seeking community engagement and the students who actually engage. After hours spent searching for and attending events that don’t live up to expectations, many students find themselves discouraged and disinterested in participating in future get-togethers.
The CommUnity team (L-R): Simon Narang, Zoe Xie, Bomi Kim, and Zyan Baptiste. Not pictured: Saidaman Earla and Yisehak Ebrahim.
As part of their Computer Science Innovation and Entrepreneurship class, Bomi Kim (BS ’23), Saidaman Earla (BS ’24), Simon Narang (BS ’23), Yisehak Ebrahim (BS ’24), Zoe Xie (BS ’24), and Zyan Baptiste (’24) created a product to revolutionize student engagement: CommUnity. The platform uses AI to generate personalized event recommendations and promotes student engagement via a trained chatbot, personalized event feeds, and strategic push notifications. The team’s ultimate goal is to strengthen students’ social connections and support their mental health.
Their $1,000 HopStart prize will support the maintenance of the CommUnity website and database as the team looks to cultivate business with higher learning institutions.
“We couldn’t have done this without the support of Professors Larry Aronhime and Anton Dahbura,” they acknowledge.