Business Commons^™

Oligram: A Cleaner And Safer World, Joshua Mu '25

IMSA / Fermi STEM Pitch

OliGram, the rapid and affordable biofilm test kit, exploits the presence of cellulose in the extracellular matrix of a biofilm. Only produced by plants and bacteria, cellulose is a suitable biomarker for detecting biofilms as plants can likely be ruled out in most contexts. To indicate the presence of cellulose, OliGram utilizes oligothiophene h-FTAA, a chemical marker which binds to cellulose molecules to create fluorescent complexes. Under a particular wavelength of light, this complex emits light of a corresponding wavelength; on the other hand, if none of the complex was formed, then no light is emitted. Thus, with this rapid …

Ftc Titans #17576 Engineering Portfolio, Gautham Anne '23, Michael Meng '25, Ebba Kaulas '24, Jayant Kumar '23, Neev Patel '25, Ankit Walishetti '25, Shawn Crimmins '24

Distinguished Student Work

IMSA's FTC Robotics Team, the FTC TITANS, was recently recognized at an educational STEM conference presenting to the student body of Orrington Elementary and invited to present at professional meetings for Molex and Caterpillar/Trimble Connectivity to spread robotics to almost 100 engineers and STEM professionals, both at the student and professional levels.

We have used STEM education and robotics to inspire over 6300 people across the globe. The team was recently awarded the 1st Place Connect Award for professional outreach and 2nd Place Inspire (Championship) Award and is excited to be competing at the State Competition.

Swine Research Industry, Alyssa Abendroth '24

Distinguished Student Work

My business research revolved around biosecurity and disease. My inquiry was led by the question How common are diseases in commercial swine units and how can they be prevented from a staff personnel standpoint?. I completed my research by gaining knowledge through experience in my internship, as well as a literature review. I could not find an explicit response to how common diseases are, but I did learn about biosecurity and disease prevention.

Openmind, Shashi Salavath '25

Distinguished Student Work

OpenMind is a mental health organization I founded that offers comprehensive resources and services to support individuals in their mental wellness journey. The organization offers a range of traditional mental health resources, such as therapy and support groups, as well as cutting-edge technology-based solutions. The flagship offering is an AI-powered mental health therapist, designed to provide accessible, on-demand support for individuals experiencing mental health challenges. OpenMind's holistic approach to mental health, combined with its innovative technology offerings, sets it apart in the field and positions it as a leader in promoting mental wellness for all.

Revolution, Michelle Sun '23

Distinguished Student Work

A game-changing shoe design for a better Earth.

Investment Analysis: The Effectiveness Of Flipping Real Estate, Kaylee Zhou

2021 Intern Reports

As an appraisal firm, Alpha Valuations focuses on providing quality service and expertise to customers. The company's objective is to provide service to those interested in knowing the amount for which a property will transact on a particular date (Pagourtzi, 2003). The aim of this business project was to focus on investment properties. I focused on researching whether flipping real estate was effective. For this project, I looked into three condos in Illinois. The first condo was in Bolingbrook, the second was in Wheaton, and the third was in Lombard. Many have described the act of property flipping as buying …

Understanding Covid-19s Effect On Commerce Through Machine Learning, Madhav Parthasarathy '21

2020 Intern Reports

During these trying times, the novel virus has taken its toll on the economy. As a result, there must be a method to prevent any further loss in revenue for grocers especially. I started this project off, by researching the topic and its previous applications. As the virus is quite new, I was made to improvise a solution using machine learning. After finding a certain amount of data, I was able to utilize machine learning in order to predict the sales through certain periods of time. Due to Covid-19, there had been an extreme disparity in the sales of grocery …

Website And Communications / Development With Iagc, Nathan Joseph '21

2020 Intern Reports

This summer, I completed a summer IMSA Internship with the Illinois Association for Gifted Children (IAGC), a non-profit aimed to provide quality education to students across the state. During this internship, I worked independently and remotely due to COVID-19 with some assistance via email or Zoom from my business mentor to complete a variety of tasks for the IAGC. Some of the endeavors that I took part in were creating website pages. Particularly, I worked on a page promoting social and emotional support for students, a page promoting and acknowledging the excellence gap, and a page answering commonly asked questions …

Marketing & Website Visual Development To Enhance Communication For Iagc, Makayla Zheng '22

2020 Intern Reports

In the Business Context portion, the general description of the industry and organization are detailed. I interned for the Illinois Association for Gifted Children (IAGC), a nonprofit organization that works in the field of education, helping to promote the development of gifted and talented children across Illinois.

In the Business Project Description section, the work I contributed to IAGC is exhibited.During this internship, I largely partook in the marketing aspects for IAGC. I mainly worked with improving the IAGC website to increase organization and visual enhancement allowing for easier accessibility for users. The Exhibits portion consists of visuals from my …

Graphic Design Internship, Jonathan Gao '21

2020 Intern Reports

I have always been my own boss. From self-learning graphic design, starting in third grade, to practicing graphic design for clubs and organizations under my digression. I have been lucky enough to work for mainly myself and, when working for others, have had to cater to exclusively my taste—my experience in doing graphic design for teams has in the past been limited to making a design I like, requesting approval with little to no necessary revisions, and finally sending the design to its final destination.

Working with the Carbondale Chamber of Commerce this summer was my first time practicing graphic …

Social Media Marketing, Christo Ekimov '22

2020 Intern Reports

Hespr is a mental health startup that believes that mental health is both a personal journey as well as a community one. Hespr is building an application that incorporates this idea using a guided journal, which facilitates the personal journey and a social platform to foster the community journey. It has a strong back-end which uses a variety of algorithms to calculate the emotions of the user. It combines all this with a sleek and functional UI. They focus on creating positive change in the world along with reimagining the way mental health is perceived and treated. As a marketing …

Safestart Medical: An Innovative Hit Solution To Never Events (Wspe), Shikhar Gupta '22

2020 Intern Reports

SafeStart Medical is a health information technology company offering a healthcare system, or electronic health record, that reduces dangerous handoff and communication errors, reduces delays and cancellations in the operating room, and empowers the patient as an active member of their care team. SafeStart is an automated and digitized revenue cycle management tool that improves perioperative patient safety, quality of care, and patient throughput. They specifically aim to prevent the occurrence of Never Events, preventable and serious medical errors that occur at an alarming rate. As an intern at SafeStart, I performed research on clinical topics such as Never Events …

Marketing Experience: Analysis Of Competitors, Kaylee Zhou '22

2020 Intern Reports

Hespr is a start-up that focuses on promoting mental health by providing an app for the community. While the app is still in its early access program, Hespr's development team has been working diligently to improve various aspects and features. Throughout my internship, many tasks and projects were completed, such as user outreach, graphic design, written reports, and research. The objectives of this business project involved gathering information on how to analyze competitors and their marketing strategies efficiently and how to identify competitors' strengths and weaknesses effectively. My internship has provided me with valuable findings, leading me to conclude that …

The Value Of Visual Marketing As A Tool To Gain Consumer Interest, Shivani Venkatraman '21

2020 Intern Reports

This year, I interned for the company SWAMR HR, their parent company being ThoughtWave Software and Solutions. SWARM HR is a company in the IT Industry, and I worked in the Marketing and Sales Department as an Inside Sales Intern. SWARM HR’s product, SWARM HR, is a workforce automation software. It helps businesses migrate to managing their employees full-time electronically, with modules for HR, ATS, and Accounting/Payroll. The business area I researched for my project was Visual Marketing. This area was one I got to explore in my internship, as I helped come up with newsletter content, infographics, and types …

Internship With Coursestars, Aakash Kumar '21

2020 Intern Reports

The plan of the company was to rework some parts of their website to automate submissions by employees and to attract more clients. The company I was interning with was CourseStars, a company that prides itself on finding excelled tutors to serve students. However, the project had a lot of complicated parts due to privacy issues and company policies.

First, the company needed to ensure that there was an easier way for them to give out tutor applications and publish tutors’ information on their website. The second issue was to drive tutor’s to work with CourseStars and make it easier …

An In Depth Look Of Marketing At Xenwork, Amanda Chen

2020 Intern Reports

Xenwork is an Information Technology service company that offers an array of solutions for its business clients. Emphasis is placed on its one of a kind software development as well as algorithms to help improve the technological side of its clients. With the ever growing market in technology, Xenwork is constantly looking to improve in any way it can.

Xenwork places a high value on customer service and marketing. Therefore, it takes an extra step to reach out to potential customers with personalized scripted messages. In addition to reaching out to potential clients, Xenwork also makes sure to be updated …

Analyzing Pricing Models In The Context Of Mental Health Markets, Edward Zhang '22

2020 Intern Reports

In today’s world, mental health is becoming an increasingly important issue. To address, this the crossroads between technology and healthcare has become more and more apparent, with many mental heath apps seeking to help consumers on this issue and reduce stigma.Hespr is one of these companies, and although in early stages of development, has a large potential to make a lasting impact.By researching pricing models and business models in the mental health software industry, this report hopes to provide insight on how these business practices can impact business finances, and ultimately have greater implications for decisions at Hespr. By using …

Marketing And Design Applications In Website Development, Amanda Chen

2020 Intern Reports

Are there universal guidelines that ensure the efficacy of a business website’s design and marketing appeal to consumers? Through the field studies of competitor businesses of private tutoring company CourseStars, LLC. as well as research journals confirming the significance of behavioral economics working hand in hand with user experience website design, we determined that the best course of action was to rebrand the CourseStars website to reflect a personal connection its tutors can make with their students. The general principles to make a “good website” are ease of use, trust, transaction security, and behaviorally, using consumers’ cost-benefit analysis and their …

Assessing Integenerational Programs Through Market Research, Rohit Kartha '22

2020 Intern Reports

Intergenerational is an adjective that describes something that involves or affects several generations. Intergenerational programs are programs which increase interaction and exchange between people of different generations. There are several benefits of intergenerational programs. Some include generating a sense of purpose for the older adults, reducing a sense of isolation for them, as well as members from each generation learning new skills. Most importantly, younger generations better understand the aging process and learn how to face their own aging more positively. As time progresses, more and more people are understanding the benefits and importance of intergenerational collaboration and as this …

Multi-Phenomena Internship With Coursestars, Joanna Menendie

2020 Intern Reports

CourseStars is an online tutoring company that caters to students from kindergarten all the way to college. The company has been focusing on community outreach, among several other things. They wanted to focus on some other aspects of their business more and needed more perspectives and hands in the company to do so. This summer, I was able to be one of those people for CourseStars and focus on many categories. Originally being taken on as a Marketing intern, it was my main focus. This included helping improve their branding, social media image, and overall outside appearance. A major part …

How To Increase A Company's Social Media Presence, Eunice Kim '22

2020 Intern Reports

The project pursued in this report is called “How to Increase a Company’s Social Media Presence.” In this context, “social media presence” will refer to how frequently Hespr posts and is active on Instagram, the levels of engagement on posts, and types of content uploaded. As the title suggests, this project will focus on factors that facilitate the growth of Hespr’s social media presence, as well as factors that may hinder progress.

Summer Internship Report, Isabel Chen '22

2020 Intern Reports

“Baby boomer,” “millennial,” and “Generations X and Z” are all familiar terms referring to the different Western cultural generations beginning from the late nineteenth century. And as they all signify a period of time in history, there are an array of associated ideas, beliefs, and traditions that come along with each. This research paper serves to explore how design and social media platforms can best cater to audiences of all generations, taking into account the differences in interests, opinions, and tendencies of each. Through observations and studies, it’s most effective to approach the audience in an attitude that is equally …

Civicly Envolved Intership: Working On The Candidate Profile Screen, Patrick Hultquist '21

2020 Intern Reports

Going into any situation, I think I’m always a little overconfident. This was no exception. I had previously made an (unimpressive) app, had talked to people before, and knew how to work with a team; so this would be all the same, right?I thought going into this that I would probably do something around 80%working and 20% learning. The very first day I realized how wrong I was. I learned that in this internship, I was going to, well, learn. At first, I felt kind of bad; I mean, I knew barely anything and had to be taught from the …

My Internship With The State Representative: An Overview, Nathan Tamez '21

2020 Intern Reports

My name is Nathan Tamez, and I am a Junior (‘21) at the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy. I am currently thinking of going into Engineering (most likely Automotive or Mechanical). Honestly, I did not know what to expect when I signed up for the internship program, but what I heard from friends and the internship coordinators reassured me that there would be many opportunities to meet people with experience and to expand my network. Just as I expected, I was able to meet plenty of people, and even establish a connection with the Aurora Collective,a conjunction of businesses based …

Web Developing With Block Bins, Rajan Savani '21

2020 Intern Reports

Block Bins is a compost collection company based in Chicago that creates food scrap drop off points using shared bins, providing an inexpensive solution to people who want to compost their food scrap. This service is enabled with a website, automation, and data collection & analysis, which were developed and improved over the course of this internship. The goal of this project was to improve the current website with an updated front-end that uses modern web frameworks and a revised back-end that is better tailored to the Block Binsuse-case. These improvements would reduce reliance on third-party software and developers, and …

Venture Capital And Marketing With K8 Ventures, Rosario Picone '21

2020 Intern Reports

K8 Ventures is a venture builder studio, with investments in a diverse range of industries. K8’sgreatest skill is developing companies in-house, starting at Stage 1, what they call “an idea written on a napkin,” to Stage 5, which is a successful business already established in the market. Because K8 is investing in early-stage companies, they typically are able to take a larger share of equity in their developing companies. This allows them to take a managerial role in the company, thus taking some of the traditional risks out of venture capital. Over the past year with K8, they have provided …

Easy-To-Use Augmented Reality In The Mobile Industry: An Internship Experience, Abhi Vinnakota '21

2020 Intern Reports

This report details the work and research I have completed over the past few months with BUNDLAR. This company is a startup located in startup incubator 1871. BUNDLAR is currently developing their augmented reality mobile app that will launch in the near future. Over my time with them, I helped with market research. My research was focused on the Augmented Reality industry and performing competitive analysis on other AR companies. With this research, I was able to provide BUNDLAR with valuable recommendations and insights that helped shape their development around the target audience and industry. In addition, I also focused …

Safestart: Simplifying Technology For Seniors, Melissa Myint '21

2020 Intern Reports

Our project is nonprofit and aims to help seniors understand how to use technology in their daily lives by creating videos that are simple and easy to follow.As in this day and age seniors are afraid to use their smart devices other than the basic call function which can prevent seniors from receiving the benefits associated with the use of apps that could track their medication, allow them to video call, and etc. These seniors are therefore being left out from the increasing digital society. In order to accomplish this goal, we are creating instructional videos on the uses of …

Wesolv: Mba Job Analysis, Xiaofan Li '21

2020 Intern Reports

WeSolv is a startup that focuses on bringing the most qualified candidates to prospective hiring companies by designing and utilizing case challenges to accurately assess the candidates’ skill sets. The case challenges consist of several activities (presentations, research, etc.) that the candidates must execute, which measure their fit for potential jobs. For the past academic year, the company has provided information on how to obtain insight on their system metrics and to better understand the process of choosing their assessing skills. Since desired skills in candidates are fluid throughout time, the company needs to constantly ensure that they have the …

Building The Coursestars Brand, Melena Braggs '21

2020 Intern Reports

The main purpose of this project was to build the brand of Course Stars, a small tutoring business based in Illinois. This brand building was done through Facebook and Instagram, and the project lasted from November 2019 to March 2020. In that time, the analytics from Facebook and Instagram were tracked and analyzed. While there was a slight increase in the amount of interactions from the sites combined, there’s still few followers on Instagram. Marketing on social media is generally helpful, but in this project it did not make a large difference.