Competition challenges undergraduate students from across Virginia to develop innovative solutions to issues facing the commonwealth and the nation.
It’s time to celebrate student-driven entrepreneurship! Tom Tom and American Evolution are proud to announce their celebrity judge and student semifinalist selections for the American Evolution Innovators Cup competition. The annual contest, which showcases Virginia’s academic excellence, is set to go down on Friday, April 12 as part of the Summit & Festival. This year, 42 student teams representing 17 Commonwealth colleges and universities and two high schools have been selected to participate in the Cup. Below is a list of schools, team names, and team participants for the competition.
SEMIFINALISTS:
Commonwealth Challenge
College of William & Mary
CounterPoise: Paige Ash, Shireen Ardaiz, Joanne Tang
George Mason University
Neumi: Sai Gurrapu, Raheel Tauyyab, Jared Ponmakha, Faisal Sabri, Anika Maan
Hampton University
Island of Stability: Andrew Gray, Alexis Darko, Kyree Sullivan, Ebony Henderson, Ethan Thompson, Kaitlyn Williams
Liberty University
Vortix Apparel: Alan Sexten
Norfolk State University
Wearable Cells: Jada Oakes, Jasmine Blair, Christy Frederick
Old Dominion University
Bookworms: Girish Sreevatsan Nandakumar, Michael Osorio, Jose Pehovaz-Diez
The University of Virginia’s College at Wise
CrowdIQ: Hunter Hess
University of Lynchburg
Doctor Now: Nicholas Louvros, Stephanie Quaranto, Claudia Lopez Perez
University of Richmond
LifeCap: Kyle Sheehan, Andrei Buna
University of Virginia
PurPics: Victor Layne, Raahish Kalaria
Riley-The Social Network for the disability and illness community: Elizabeth Tikoyan, Mari Tikoyan
Shakti Apparel: Shafat Khan, Jane Hammaker
Minimally Invasive Spinal Technology, LLC: Alexander Singh, Rohit Rustagi, George Vithoulkas, Eric Taleghani
Truly OpenML: Daniel Knorr, Jaspreet Ranjit
Virginia Commonwealth University
Hyperloop at VCU: Arthur Chadwick, Matthew Kozak, Harrison Powers, David Burke, Nolan Burke
HeartComm: Carter Spiers, Alexa Lightfoot, Aysha Brown, Ben Bethard, Jonathon Headley
HeartSaver: Samuel Yohannes, Cameron Johnson, Rachel Judge
Guide-wire Clamp: Gabriel Davis, Hannah Wales, Shai-Keria Dwight, Veronica Dunbar, Samuel Baker
Virginia Military Institute (VMI)
Keydet Cap Aero: Patrick Fowler, Jonathan Chamberlain, James Seal, Bennett Johnson
Virginia State University
Natural Black Velvet: Destiny Hodges, Chanel Brown, Amaya Moses, Marcus Jones, Alex Wade, Diamond Fayton, Stacy Holloway, Unique Lotman, Tamia Reese, Alex Wade, Guy DeWeever
Virginia Tech
OcuBloc: Jeremy Myslowski, Demisha Porter, Aditya Sircar
QuickTech Medical: Jacob Merizian, Glenn Feit, Matthew Severance
GiraffeGear: Nick Tang,Thomas Kronenberg, Parker Smith
Rendyr: Kaelum Hasler, Martin Angst, Elijah Hodges, Liam Lawrence, Callan McGill, Reid Holbert
SEMIFINALISTS:
Reinventing High School Challenge
George Mason University
Turning High School Into Life School: Yassmin Salem
Germanna Community College
Spanish Dual-Immersion: James Caras, Kyle Close, Helen Padilla, Jose Diaz-Rivera, Bryan Palmeri, Andrew Pinney, Lydia Scoon-Rogers, Connie Wells
Albemarle High School
The SAGE Model: David Glover,Christian Opitz, Jack Kircher
Monticello High School
Innovative Humanities: Lucy Abell
James Madison University
The Bridge Project – Reinventing the High School Experience: C. Shea Burch, Cameron Robinson, Lexy Foor, Christian Caruso, Sina Shahcheraghi, Peyton Major
Roanoke College
Education for the Individual: Matthew Myers
COLLAB Learning Curriculum: Cameron Guernsey, Erik Stefanowicz, Grayson White, Trey Perry
Prepping for Your Gig: William White, Samuel Carpenter
Educating the Future: Kieran Ridgway, Ryan Denholm
University of Virginia
Pick-Me-Up: Sasha Duckworth, Srijay Kasturi, Emily Smith, Kurien Thomas
MetaCTF: Jake Smith, Mariah Kenny, Roman Bohuk, Marina Sanusi
InternLab: Yash Tekriwal, Kate McGinn
ReinventED’s Reinventing High School Kit: Melissa Wu, Keaton Wadzinski, Aditya Narayan
Project HD: Amanullah Waheed, Jake Wisnicki
Virginia Commonwealth University
Computer Science Curriculum for Richmond Public Schools: Wolfgang Schrader, Samuel Slocum, Michael Meilinger, Quinn Holt, Lindsey Smith, Aleksandr Podyachev
Global Classroom: Hu Zhai, Zhixin An
Virginia Tech
Redshift Education, Inc.: Maria Jernigan, Kiran Bagalkotkar, Taylor Carroll, Jooyoung Whang, Vince DiNardo, Mark Carman
AEIC CELEBRITY JUDGES
A panel of industry expert judges will hear presentations from the Virginia student team finalists and select winners of the competition’s cash prizes totaling $60,000, as well as access to mentorship opportunities and investor meetings. The competition’s celebrity judges include:
Jason Feifer: Editor-in-Chief, Entrepreneur magazine; Host, Problem Solvers and Pessimists Archive podcasts
Henry Hipps: Deputy Director of the Education team, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Karen Jackson: Former Secretary of Technology, Commonwealth of Virginia
David Hall: Partner, Rise of the Rest Seed Fund
Navin Thukkaram: Lead Investor and Board Member, SkyKick
Shawn Boehn: Chief Transformative Officer, Year Up
Presented in Partnership With
