Wiingy Future STEM Leaders Scholarship

Huldah Agbo

The University of Houston | TX, USA

Summer break began, and I felt a wave of anxiety. Just four days after graduating high school, I attended freshman orientation. Everything happened so fast. I was thrust into a sphere of unfamiliar faces, after spending seven years in my small town where I saw the same 400 or so people every day (minus the COVID year, but even then, I saw them all online). A month into my senior year, I deleted TikTok because it had become a major distraction, keeping me from interacting with others and completing my schoolwork and chores. The dopamine rush from scrolling felt more satisfying than real-life connections. After graduation and orientation, I reinstalled TikTok, hoping to connect with new people I had met. Despite my desire for genuine interaction, my brain preferred the instant gratification of social media. This led me to numb myself with TikTok, Instagram, and music, and I became increasingly hostile to anyone who disrupted my screen time, like my parents who became worried as they started to observe the shift. Suppressed emotions caused me to overreact to minor issues. I also stopped indulging in my hobbies and working out. On July 2nd, it all came to a head. It was around 10 PM, after a long day of scrolling through TikTok, Instagram, shopping apps and Netflix. My mom informed me that I had to do my chores before bed. As I removed my earbuds, which had been drowning out my thoughts with music all day, I began to shake uncontrollably. Quickly, I put them back in and did my chores, washing a sink full of dishes. When I finished, I went back to my bed and continued scrolling, only to notice that I was shaking while doing so. Suddenly, my eyes were opened. Using the split-screen feature on my iPad, I was watching a basketball game while shopping for clothes. My phone had Instagram open, and I was listening to music. On another open app running in the background was my TikTok ""For You"" page, which I alternated between Instagram, Spotify, and TikTok. At that moment, I turned everything off. What was I doing to myself? This isn't unique to me, though. Gen Z is terrified of FOMO. According to Squarespace, 92% of Gen Z multitasks while on their devices, such as watching a basketball game while scrolling through a shopping app. We crave connection. But from that moment, I decided to do a ‘blackout’: no scrolling, no music, no Instagram, YouTube, or Netflix for a week. The next morning was tough; I felt a strong urge to open TikTok when I woke up. Instead, I went to the gym. The rest of the day, I had great ideas that had been suppressed by social media and shopping apps. I even found and made a list of 31 scholarships to apply for in July. It's been 22 days since I woke up to the reality of my FOMO. As I enter college, I plan to implement ‘blackouts’ regularly, maybe half of the week. The unexpected lesson I've learned this summer is that social media doesn't need to take center stage in your daily life. Go for a walk, go to the gym, bake something, call your grandma—staying informed and connected is good, but making time to work out the stuff in your brain is even better for you and the people around you. I no longer lash out at people because the pixels on my screen take the backstage, while the people I can see and the tasks I have in person take center stage in my life now.

Raghav Katta

UT Austin | Texas, USA

As a child, I was captivated by the magic in the world around me, from mythical creatures to superheroes. Although those illusions faded with time, I found a new kind of magic in technology. As the eldest son in an immigrant household, I often had to get creative to make toys for me and my sister. Through origami, drawings, and a touch of imagination, I turned random scraps into robots, mechs, and dolls.This childhood spirit of innovation and creativity only grew into ever more convoluted projects as I grew. This summer, I embarked on a new quest: creating a liquid-lens phoropter. As someone with astigmatism and myopia, I often experienced the inconvenience and cost of routine eye check-ups. When I learned about liquid lens technology, I immediately jumped at the chance to apply it to the phoropter, a bulky device with hundreds of lenses used universally for vision testing despite its inefficiency. With liquid lens technology, the cost could be dramatically reduced, making it more accessible. My team, composed entirely of freshmen with no faculty advisors and only our savings, faced significant challenges. Despite our limited resources, we set our sights on the grand stage of the Rice360 Global Design Conference. Competing against teams from prestigious universities, many with multiple faculty and graduate advisors, we persevered. After months of research, consulting professors, and scrutinizing the machine with my optometrist, we discovered innovative ways to integrate liquid lens technology into phoropters. Our breakthrough could be produced, marketed, sold, and shipped for just $300, achieving a 90% weight reduction compared to existing models. However, the most unexpected lesson came from my participation in a summer entrepreneurship program. This program taught me how to transform our prototype into a viable startup. I received mentorship and advice on creating a business model canvas, validating ideas, securing finance, and communicating with manufacturers. I advanced our prototype and learned about gaskets, pressure, exploded views for manufacturing, creating a bill of materials, and engineering tolerance drawings. The program also emphasized the importance of idea validation. We conducted surveys and interviews to ensure our product met the needs of potential users. This feedback loop was crucial in refining our design and pitch. I learned how to present our project compellingly, highlighting its potential impact and feasibility. One of the most valuable aspects of the program was the mentorship. Experienced entrepreneurs provided guidance and shared their insights, helping us navigate the challenges of starting a business. Their encouragement and advice were instrumental in building our confidence and determination, and are vital as we now embark on the goal of raising money to bring this product in the hands of those who need it the most. Although we haven’t yet produced ""sufficiently advanced technology"" to be mistaken for magic, the path toward that technology and its impact is nothing short of magical. Learning the process of bringing an idea to fruition, researching current applications and constraints, and understanding funding and pitching has pushed me toward pursuing engineering. Whether studying math, learning more about liquid lens technology, or performing undergraduate research, I’m doing the same thing I always have: seeking magic.