Since the beginning of March, four SFU students have been competing in a national hackathon hosted by Experience Ventures, with local support from SFU VentureLabs, with their concept for an app that has taken them to the top.

SFU computing science majors Angelina Lim, Lotus Liu, Chau Pham and English and philosophy major Sophie MacDonald are the team behind the wellness app concept called Eventful. It is designed to facilitate more social opportunities and bolster SFU students’ sense of integration and community on campus. Their app concept seeks to tackle issues like lack of accessibility, lack of inclusivity and commitment barriers by creating an app that incorporates an event calendar where students can easily share events and communicate with each other as well as implementing event-specific councils within faculties for cross-departmental connection. 

The Experience Ventures National Hackathon is a national case competition-style event intended to highlight entrepreneurial-minded Canadian students and empower them to solve real problems facing their post-secondary campuses today under this year’s theme of wellness. “Our team decided to focus on the mental wellness of students around campus and after surveying students, we realized SFU was especially lacking in accessible social activities and that students felt very disconnected from one another,” cites Lotus Liu. The Eventful team notes how the pandemic took a significant toll on students’ mental health and sense of connection and that this app concept can improve wellness by fostering a sense of community. 

The team successfully made it to the top three of the national hackathon competing against 160 other university students from across Canada, with the competition having concluded on March 29 where the team earned 2nd place. The Eventful team is rightfully proud to have made it to the end. “When I learned that we made it to the top three, I was speechless. My team and I tried our best, but we all did not have any expectations of making it to the top three. I am extremely proud of my team,” says Angelina Lim.

SFU VentureLabs is excited to co-host the local portion of the hackathon with program partner, Experience Ventures, powered by the Hunter Hub for Entrepreneurial Thinking at the University of Calgary. Experience Ventures facilitates entrepreneurial work placements for innovative post-secondary students. As a tech and science-based accelerator that is a key part of Simon Fraser University, VentureLabs matched its network of growing companies with 36 skilled students since last fall. 

Congratulations to the Eventful team for their well-earned success in this competition. We look forward to seeing their continued innovation and problem solving on the SFU campus and beyond.