When Duke Engage was cancelled this summer, I was incredibly sad. I was planning on an incredibly educational summer in the Bahamas, learning about the impact the many large hurricanes have on the island’s people and its economy. I would have gotten the amazing opportunity to help build a school and its curriculum from the ground up, and learn about economic planning to prepare for the next hurricane. After my project’s cancellation, though, I wanted to do something that would make me use my technical skills I was learning in school while still having a positive impact on the world.
Enter Konektid. Konektid International is a company that works on connecting emerging businesses in the AID sector with USAID grants, allowing them to have a better chance of winning these grants and conducting aid work around the world. Their mission is to allow more small companies to enter the sector, because, as of now, the space is dominated by a few large companies. For Konektid, I will be working on automating a product that they think is one of their most useful. Konektid releases a monthly newsletter listing which projects will be released soon by USAID, and which companies they think will bid on these projects. To write this newsletter, they scour pages and pages of data for hours on end. But, through the power of computer science and machine learning, we will be able to automate this process and allow them to use their time elsewhere.
I am incredibly excited for what the rest of the summer holds. Our mentors at Konektid are a group of amazing, driven people, always ready to learn about what we are doing and teach us about their work. I am sure that interning at Konektid will be an amazing experience!
