A wide shot of a ceramics studio, featuring students working with pottery wheels and other tools.

SAIC students sweep the Amita Design Challenge

SAIC students swept the Amita Design Challenge, 24 hour hackathon. SAIC students won first and second prizes, over the University of Chicago, Northwestern, UIC, Harper College, IIT, Governors State University,  NIU, Dominican University and DePaul University.

Team 1 - First Prize $2000

Taylor Staugas, Senior, 
Vi Bautista, Junior 
Paige Landesberg, Senior
Bailey Fontaine, Senior
Angela Huang, Senior

Their concept was the Kindred, a standard alarm clock connected to Wi-Fi that would enable a user to communicate with family members or anyone else information about their well-being -- using a 1-10 scale -- remotely through an app.

Team 2 - Second Prize. $1500


Mina Drezner, Senior
Aseese Kaur Grewal, Junior
Celine Setiadi, Senior
Jill Zheng, Junior 
Joanna Artemis Veleris, Senior

AMITAMATE, a database for older adults that enables them to communicate with their doctors, while also allowing different doctors treating the same patient to talk to each other. Medical records could be uploaded to the "AMITA cloud" for viewing. In addition, it would have a human component, promoting an intergenerational living situation, with college students living for free with the older adults and helping them manage the database.

Click here for the Daily Herald article
For more information on the Amita Design Challenge, click here

Team 2 - Second Prize. $1500

Student Nitya Mehrotra’s Animations Give a Voice to Victims

With her Stories by Strangers project, student Nitya Mehrotra uses her skills as an artist to tell the stories of sexual and mental abusive survivors.

Student Nitya Mehrotra’s Animations Give a Voice to Victims