FALL 2020
VOL. XV
THE ALBERT DORMAN HONORS COLLEGE NEWSLETTER HERE'S WHAT'S HAPPENING 25th Anniversary of ADHC PAGE 1
Entrepreneurship at ADHC: Ember PAGES 2-3
Entrepreneurship at ADHC: Glyde App PAGES 3-5
Imperfect Interview to Perfect Internship PAGES 5-7
The Student Research Experience PAGES 7-8
Student Internship Experience: Twitter PAGES 9-10
A QUARTER CENTURY AGO, THE ALBERT DORMAN HONORS COLLEGE WAS FOUNDED AT NJIT TO FOSTER AN INTELLECTUAL COMMUNITY OF SCHOLARS, ALUMNI, FACULTY, AND STAFF DEVOTED TO PURSUING EDUCATION AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT. 2020 MARKS THE 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE ALBERT DORMAN HONORS COLLEGE. THIS YEAR IS UNIQUE NOT ONLY BECAUSE OF THE ANNIVERSARY MILESTONE, BUT ALSO BECAUSE OF THE UNPRECEDENTED CHANGES IN OUR UNIVERSITY AND THE GREATER COMMUNITY DUE TO THE CURRENTLY ONGOING COVID-19 GLOBAL PANDEMIC. OUR ALUMNI ON THE ADHC 25TH COMMITTEE HAVE WORKED TOGETHER TO PLAN A SERIES OF SPECIAL EVENTS TO CELEBRATE THE 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE HONORS COLLEGE, WHICH HAVE NOW GONE VIRTUAL DUE TO THE CURRENT STATE OF THE WORLD. THESE EVENTS INCLUDE A LIVE, VIRTUAL TOUR OF THE ALBERT DORMAN HONORS COLLEGE AND RESIDENCE HALL, A DISCUSSION ABOUT THE ACCOMPLISHMENTS, HISTORY, AND FUTURE OF THE HONORS COLLEGE WITH ALBERT DORMAN ‘45 AND HIS FAMILY ALONG WITH PRESIDENT JOEL S. BLOOM AND DEAN LOUIS HAMILTON, AND A CELEBRATORY TOAST. WE ARE SO PROUD OF OUR FACULTY, STAFF, AND STUDENTS FOR THE WAY THEY HAVE ADAPTED TO THE SITUATION AND GONE ABOVE AND BEYOND WHAT IS EXPECTED OF THEM. IN THIS ISSUE, WE STRIVED TO EMPHASIZE THE CONTINUED SUCCESS OF OUR STUDENTS IN THE FACE OF ADVERSITY BY HIGHLIGHTING STUDENT ACCOMPLISHMENTS. ARTICLES IN THIS ISSUE TELL THE STORIES OF EXCEPTIONAL STUDENTS IN THE HONORS COLLEGE WHO HAVE SHOWN THEIR TALENTS AND DEDICATION TO SUCCESS AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT IN A RANGE OF WAYS. SOME STUDENTS DEVELOPED THEIR OWN STARTUPS, OTHERS TOOK THEIR TALENTS TO CORPORATE AND GOVERNMENT INTERNSHIPS, AND STILL OTHERS HAVE CONDUCTED CUTTING-EDGE UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH. IT WAS INSPIRING TO READ ABOUT THEIR STORIES, AND WE HOPE THAT YOU WILL FEEL THE SAME WAY. WE WOULD LIKE TO THANK MS. ALICIA FEGHHI FOR BEING A PART OF THE HONORS COLLEGE FOR THE PAST FIVE YEARS, AND MORE SPECIFICALLY, FOR HER PAST GUIDANCE AND ASSISTANCE IN PUTTING TOGETHER THE NEWSLETTER. THE NEWSLETTER WOULD NOT BE WHERE IT IS TODAY WITHOUT HER, AND WE WILL MISS HER GREATLY AS WE BID HER FAREWELL AND WISH HER GOOD LUCK AT HER NEW POSITION AT HACKENSACK MERIDIAN HEALTH SCHOOL OF MEDICINE AT SETON HALL. ADDITIONALLY, WE WOULD LIKE TO THANK MS. ANA CANEIRA FOR ALL HER GUIDANCE AND ASSISTANCE WITH PUTTING TOGETHER THE NEWSLETTER THIS YEAR. WE ARE SO PROUD OF THE ACHIEVEMENTS AND EXPERIENCES OF BOTH HONORS STUDENTS AND STAFF. OUR WRITERS, PHOTOGRAPHERS, DESIGNERS, AND EDITORS DO THEIR BEST TO ACCURATELY AND EFFECTIVELY DEPICT THE SUCCESS STORIES OF OUR SCHOLARS. THE SEMESTER MAY BE DIFFERENT FROM ALL PREVIOUS SEMESTERS, BUT ONE THING THAT HAS REMAINED UNCHANGED IS THE MOTIVATION AND DEDICATION OF THE PEOPLE IN THE HONORS COLLEGE. WE WISH FOR EVERYONE’S SAFETY AND GOOD HEALTH, AND HOPE YOU ENJOY READING! BEST, THE EDITORS
Entrepreneurship at ADHC: Ember BY AARATI SRIKUMAR Parth Agrawal is a sophomore studying Biomedical Engineering as a student in the Albert Dorman Honors College. He is a self-driven entrepreneur who created his startup Ember two months ago, with the hopes of streamlining communication between emergency medical services and hospital care. The idea first came in high school, when he noticed the time it took for doctors to get the data they needed to treat their patients, so Parth, along with two classmates decided to tackle the problem. The idea is based on merging data to be a constant stream of posts, similar to a stream of social media posts. Parth has said that the exact details of the idea change over time based on feedback he receives from medical professionals; however, the basic notion is the same--they need to get imperative patient data into the hands of doctors as quickly and efficiently as possible. At the moment, his team is in a dual-phase of customer discovery and application development. He is shadowing and interviewing physicians and clinicians at the University Hospital located in Newark, while the team's UX designer Sarah Ryu, a HumanComputer Interaction (HCI) student in the Honors College, is simultaneously working on the visual necessities of the app. “It's a UX project,” Parth explains, “Not a new device or new health record system. We want our app to integrate easily into the schedules of nurses and doctors and help them visually see the data relevant to their patients.” The startup aims to redefine the way physicians interact with the health record system to save time in their busy schedules and allow more patients to be treated. Getting the right data to the right people will help move patients in and out of hospitals and clear up space in our current overcrowded system. The spread of COVID-19 has not only tested the quality of our medical care but also the ability of doctors to treat more patients, so the Ember team's app will prove even more useful in optimizing the flow of data. The streamlining of data will be a huge time saver and facilitate more people in need of medical attention. The app can help physicians track lab results and the materials they have ordered.
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WRITTEN BY
Aarati Srikumar
"We want our app to integrate easily into the schedules of nurses and doctors and help them visually see the data relevant to their patients." Parth Agrawal ADHC ENTREPRENEUR
Entrepreneurship at ADHC: Ember (continued) Parth and his team have big dreams which could change the nature of modern hospital and hospice care, and they hope to work on the startup after graduation. When the customer discovery phase is concluded, the team will direct its focus to the application's development and aims to launch its product in the University Hospital's cloud, targeting it on Emergency Room care. Parth finds VentureLink to be a huge assistance to his endeavors. It gives him a community in which he can bounce ideas off other entrepreneurs and gain encouragement from other people working on their startups. Many of the hurdles teams at VentureLink go through are common to most startups, so the young entrepreneurs can lean on each other for advice and support. When asked about how he deals with failure as it is inevitable at some point for an entrepreneur, Parth says he breaks down his obstacles. He tries to identify if the problem lies in engineering, tech, or a lack of data and then assesses what tools are available. One of the issues he is currently encountering due to the spread of the coronavirus is getting in touch with doctors to interview them; however, he remains optimistic about the future. His personal motivation in getting Ember off the ground is knowing that he is doing something that will impact people in a positive way and benefit society. Parth maintains that VentureLink has been a tremendous support for the Ember team. He says, “In entrepreneurship, you have to work really hard. It would not be possible without VentureLink's network and community, as well as the Albert Dorman Honors College's opportunities.”
Entrepreneurship at ADHC: GlydeApp BY VARUN PAI The Albert Dorman Honors College (ADHC) takes pride in the success of its students, most of whom reach the heights of their professional careers after graduation or after attending professional school. Samir Peshori, however, is making major strides along his career path already as an ADHC junior. He is a double major in Computer Science and Information Technology, with a minor in Business. Samir didn’t intend to start a business when he entered college, but he is now the co-founder and COO at GlydeApp Inc.,a company whose application aims to automate the ordering and payment process at various venues, ranging from restaurants to stadiums. Glyde is an application that automates the ordering and payment process. At a restaurant, for example, customers simply have to scan a QR code at the table and they will be able to access a digital menu from which they can order food and pay for it. This aims to save time and reduce inefficiency, leading to more tableturns and sales in totality for the restaurant. Customers are also able to receive a menu tailored for them, while restaurants are able to gather more information about what patrons prefer. Parth Agrawal Samir has been working on Glyde for around 2 years, but began developing it only 7-9 months ago. He started with a digital marketing firm and kept the idea for GlydeApp in his back pocket; however, along with his development team, he decided that they wanted to push for something more and find a niche in a market that has more opportunities for innovation. Having this mentality has resulted in enormous
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Entrepreneurship at ADHC: Ember (continued) progress on the financial, legal, and practical fronts for Glyde. According to Samir, "During freshman year, I met two people who went on to become my best friends and a part of my development team at New Student Orientation (NSO) and later on in the year. They shared the same mindset and had a positive mentality, which I really connected with and sought to surround myself with. Later on, Ms. Chipepo recommended me for the Board of Trustees scholarship, through which I met Simon Nines, who is the current Vice President of NJIT and the former director of VentureLink. Through that scholarship and mentorship I received, I was able to make the connection to VentureLink, where I met Will [Lutz] and the company really took off. I’m so grateful to Ms. Chipepo in particular for making that connection and for her work with the staff." When asked if there was ever a time that he felt the dream was over after becoming successful and almost a poster child for VentureLink, Samir responds, "I wasn’t meant to come to NJIT--I was actually meant to be a military kid. My plan was to join the Coast Guard Academy and do search & rescue, but during senior year of high school I tore my anterior cruciate ligament (ACL). As a result of my condition, I was not able to join the Coast Guard Academy and that was one of the lowest points of my life. But the truth is that whenever something like that happens, people are given a new set of cards which they didn’t have when they were going in. Rather than bemoaning that set of cards, the fact that there are cards at all to play and a chance to play those cards is what is important. It is all up to the individual and I used my work ethic to overcome that bad experience and turn it into something positive at NJIT." As a student, Samir’s primary goal is to obtain an education and work towards his degree. But understanding the dynamic between the demands of his academic life and budding business career are important lessons for all students who are interested in pursuing such a path. Glyde is an entirely student-run and student-developed company. When asked how he thinks that affects its identity, Samir says, "As students, we are not fully informed about the business world when we go into our venture. As a result, we play the cards as they come--
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WRITTEN BY
Varun Pai
"Surrounding yourself with likeminded people and actively looking for the resources to make your dream happen, regardless of whether it is related to business, is what makes success." Samir Peshori ADHC ENTREPRENEUR
Entrepreneurship at ADHC: Ember (continued) or example, I didn’t know how to start an incorporated company and, nor was I aware of all of the legal aspects of starting a business, but I was able to learn how to manage all these things. In a way, this approach allows us to keep the experience fresh and makes the work enjoyable. As students, we also have to stay on top of things, seek new opportunities, and make sure we realize the novelty and freshness of the whole experience. Another important consideration is that our app caters to the same age group as the one we belong to, which gives us more knowledge about the purpose and goals of the app and allows us to envision and execute it in its best form." Samir’s emphasis on the right mentality and a willingness to try new ventures, even if beyond business, was a large part of what contributed to his success. In his own words, he realized the importance of being willing to bet on oneself, which when combined with hard work, is more important to him than intelligence. When it comes to advice Samir would give to students who are interested in starting a business, he states, "It’s always important to try new ventures and not have mental inhibitions; a lot of people don’t tackle new problems or try new research because they doubt their ability to do it. But having an openmind is key. Surrounding yourself with like-minded people and actively looking for the resources to make your dream happen, regardless of whether it is related to business, is what makes success. That’s how I started down the path that led to Glyde; I wanted to involve myself more and push myself which ultimately led to a first and then a second business founded around open-mindedness and the willingness to admit that I wasn’t going to just graduate from college asa CS/IT double major and then get a regular job in the field."
Imperfect Interview Leads to the Perfect Internship Experience BY MARIAM SHAROBIM
With the World Trade Center being a train ride away, NJIT students definitely do not skip out on opportunities to explore New York City. Once in the city, it takes steps to see the types of public transportation available. This is demonstrated in the busy streets flooded with buses and taxi cabs, the pedestrians traveling by foot, crossing every way, and from the Brooklyn Bridge to the Times Square subway station to the Holland Tunnel. Behind the scenes of these intricate transportation paths and structures is the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. With so many places to eat, socialize, and create memories, the average person can easily fail to admire the work put into organizing the city to successfully get people to their destinations. Last summer, Victoria Nguyen, a junior at NJIT, got the opportunity to intern at the Port Authority in the World Trade Center and learn about the policies and legislation behind New York’s transportation infrastructure. Victoria is currently double majoring in History and Law,
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Imperfect Interview Leads to the Perfect Internship Experience (continued) Technology, and Culture and minoring in Global Studies with a concentration in Middle Eastern Studies. Although she walked into NJIT as a biology student, her plans to pursue a career in STEM changed as she discovered her interests and the work she loves doing. Prior to this internship, Victoria exposed herself early to politics with her first internship being with her representative. Soon enough, politics and law naturally became a direction for her to progress in. These experiences played a key role in allowing Victoria to have her resume stand out and show that she can be trusted to have the necessary communication skills and attention to detail for the position. Although Victoria remembers applying rather vaguely, she remembers going through the interview process because of a sudden change of details that left her nervous. Her first interview was in person and she thought it had gone well. To her surprise, she then received a phone call from who would later be her supervisor, asking to interview her a second time over the phone. The day of, Victoria got ready to answer the phone for the interview, but the call never came. With each minute that passed, Victoria’s heart beat faster and her thoughts scattered.
"Whether they want to pursue you for the internship is on their own terms, but what you can deliver to the table is what’s important for that moment, and besides you never know if a good interview or a bad interview does or does not lead to an offer in the end." Victoria Nguyen ADHC CLASS OF 2021
Staying in control, she emailed his secretary, finding later that her interviewer was stuck in a meeting and forgot. He rearranged for a time to call her later that same day. Victoria shared that although she had her notes in front of her, this small change threw her off track; she found herself stuttering and having difficulty communicating her thoughts in a coherent manner. At that point, she thought that any chance, whether big or small, of her receiving the position was officially gone. Reflecting on the experience, Victoria’s message to others is the importance of just doing your part in an effort to pitch yourself to the company as the best candidate for the position. She went on to share that, “Whether they want to pursue you for the internship is on their own terms, but what you can deliver to the table is what’s important for that moment, and besides you never know if a good interview or a bad interview does or does not lead to an offer in the end.” Victoria thinks of this internship as a unique experience that allowed her to work in a company that was both public and private. As an Internal Governmental Affairs Intern, she was able to track Congressional bills and see how some of the most obscure laws could potentially have a great impact on public
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transportation. She also sat through confidential meetings. Towards the end of the internship, she was able to come together with a few other interns to plan an event that served to empower young girls by inviting them to the company for a day where they got to meet various women working there. Emphasizing how respected she felt, Victoria pointed out that one thing she appreciated most about the Port Authority was how much they took employee rights seriously. She felt that her work was appreciated, which she did not expect since she was an intern. Looking back, her biggest lesson learned was first impressions and work ethic matter. Her favorite memories were meeting such inspirational mentors that she was able to connect with. Now, moving forward, Victoria is set on her dream to enter the political field. She applied for a Compliance summer internship again at the Port Authority. Although transportation is not necessarily her passion and plan after graduation, this specific experience made her consider a career in lobbying. She went on to say that she hopes to be able to transfer all the skills she gained to a rather “cool” company such as Spotify.
Student Research Experience BY RAMITA SAJANKILA “You need experience to get a job, but how do you get experience without a job?” This question seems to continuously plague college students seeking job experience and opportunities while struggling to balance them with schoolwork. Although it may seem difficult, it is possible to gain experience in college without compromising schoolwork; in the name of education, we, as students, tend to be fed information that others have already learned or discovered. Student research on campus gives us the opportunity to enhance our current knowledge and provides better understanding of classes pertaining to our individual majors. At the same time, student research is a way to work with others and experiment with novel ideas, instead of conducting experiments in class in which you already know what the results should be. To further my knowledge about student research, I contacted Katherine Ji, a sophomore in the Albert Dorman Honors College. She is a Biology major, and did her research in the Honors Summer Research Interview under Dr. Bharat Biswal. Her work was titled "An Exploratory Study into the Effects of Total Sleep Deprivation using fNIRS."
The idea to join a research project was introduced to Katherine by one of her professors, who brought up the idea of using fNIRS, a “new and cheap” neuroimaging technique in comparison to fMRIs and EEGs, to test for brain activity, and invited her to test the condition. She participated in the data collection portion, where she prepared the experiment and advertised for twenty college-age test subjects to conduct an fNIRS exam on. Katherine decided to test for the “effects of sleep deprivation on cognitive
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Student Research Experience (continued) function.” Sleep has an incredible effect on our personal health and learning ability, and there is a growing issue with how we treat sleep, considering “since 1980, the number of adults sleeping less than 6 hours per night has increased by 30 percent.” This alarming statistic, combined with her own experience as a college student, encouraged her to pursue this study. She used fNIRS to measure the hemodynamic response of the brain, which is founded on the theory that the increased activity of a brain region results in more oxygen expenditure in that specific area. With this in mind, Katherine “shot infrared lights into the scalp, resulting in varying light intensities of oxygenated and/or deoxygenated hemoglobin bouncing back” to measure the hemodynamic data. These experiments were carried out on a group of twenty college students, once well-rested and once sleep-deprived. Combined with psychological tests, she concluded that her initial hypothesis, sleep deprivation results in decreased cognitive function was correct. According to Katherne, she has found “lots of purpose in doing research, even if you don’t totally reach your goal”. The research process is challenging, but it can be carried out in multiple ways with many different techniques and processes. Katherine says it is “astonishing how similar the physical process is to the scientific one,” remarking on how everything tends to take more time in a lab than in the classroom, in order to ensure extreme accuracy in one’s measurements. She also says that she “definitely came out better” from research, saying that it improved her life both personally and academically. Katherine recommends on-campus research to anybody who sees research as a way to improve themselves and takes pleasure in it. In other words, if you see working in a lab as a chore, it probably isn’t right for you. Specifically, she says that “it’s not for everybody, but make sure you enjoy it” if you are planning to pursue research. Currently, Katherine is working under Dr. Biswal on the same project regarding the effects of lack of sleep on cognitive function. She is also helping others write and edit papers on their own projects and continuing research with fNIRS on topics other than that of sleep. She is planning to study the effects of hunger and fasting on cognitive function and brain activity using fNIRS and similar hemodynamic response evaluation. The research process is one that you can use to test your hypothesis, create new ideas, and run experiments using novel devices and intriguing methods that have not been used before. It is certainly a difficult task to juggle school work and research, and it is not suitable for everyone. However, if you are fascinated by the idea of research and are willing to put in the work to come up with ingenious ideas and carry out experiments, then maybe the student research experience is for you!
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25th Anniversary88Special
Student Internship Experience: Twitter BY ISABEL HERZOG Every year, countless students from the Honors College intern at prestigious companies. Hasumi Hayashi (CS ‘21), who works as a grader for the CS department, is one such student. She interned at Twitter for two consecutive summers in 2019 and 2020. “I found out about Twitter’s application in September, about nine months before the start of the internship. I found out about it from another student here in the Honors College,” said Hayashi, recalling her experience initially applying to Twitter in 2018. “The application for Twitter opens August 1 each year, which is early. I interviewed at other companies but ended up choosing Twitter because I thought it would be really exciting to work for their web client and work on features that millions of users would see. It was in San Francisco, so I got to experience [that] as well.” After applying in mid-September, Hayashi heard back from Twitter within a month informing her that she had made it to the final round. It was memorable to her because it was around Halloween, and she was only given two weeks’ notice to decide whether or not she would fly out to the San Francisco headquarters for the final round. Hayashi agreed, and she prepared for the three 45-minute interviews. “I had two technical interviews, each with an engineer who works on the web client team. The last was a behavioral interview with my would-be manager,” said Hayashi. “A good way to prepare is to do several interviews before with other companies you’re interested in. I did mock interviews with friends and for technical practice, I worked on a bunch of questions on LeetCode, a resource for CS students. I got practice for the behavioral interview by doing actual interviews with local New Jersey companies— that gives you the best practice.” Hayashi’s interview preparation paid off, and she accepted an offer to intern with Twitter. Overall, she thoroughly enjoyed her experience, from the diverse work atmosphere, to the tight-knit connections with coworkers, to learning new technologies and working on her intern project. “My main project for the last four weeks was to build a feature. When you’re at a profile page on Twitter and click the follow button, you’ll see three suggested users to follow slide out. I built that feature,” said Hayashi. “During my internship, Twitter did a launch of a web redesign, so a lot of changes were made to fix and replace old features. I worked a lot on the redesign and made little tweaks. For example, if the “Followers You Know” list is empty, it won’t be visible like it was earlier. “Since it was my first internship, everything about it was pretty new. A lot of the tools I used were new like JIRA. We used a lot of Slack, which I was used to. What shocked me was the wide age range of engineers on the team. There were some people my age and others in their 40s and 50s. I really liked that because everyone was willing to help even a junior like me. They want you to succeed, which was nice to see. I also liked that there were a lot of women on my team. ”Hayashi’s advice for other students seeking internships is to “apply to as many companies as possible and keep track of them on a spreadsheet.” Staying organized and optimistic is an important part of the internship search.
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Student Internship Experience: Twitter (continued) “A lot of companies won’t even send a rejection notification. If you’re a CS major looking for a technical internship, you should have projects on your resume, whether it’s school projects or personal pet projects,” said Hayashi. “This is especially important if you haven’t had an internship before. You should update your resume as frequently as possible. Whenever you notice that you learned a new program language or worked on a cool project, add that to your resume. Prepare using LeetCode and mock interviews. Hopefully, if you apply to a lot of companies, you’ll hear back from some of them, which is also good interview practice.”
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