Their team name may be cutesy but these gals mean business. In 2009 Team MangoBunnies became the first all-woman team to make it to the U.S. Imagine Cup finals (they came in second). They have made it to the U.S. finals once again in the 2010 competition. This time their entry is a phone app designed to prevent violence against women. It runs in the background and presents an alert when approaching an area where a rape has been documented.
The members of the 2010 Team MangoBunnies are:
- Ashley Myers, DePauw University
- Malisa Vongskul, Indiana University/Purdue University at Indianapolis
Erin ‘Ed’ Donahue, who was a team member in 2009, now serves as team mentor. Do any of these young women’s names sound familiar? Ed blogged for ABI last week about the positive impacts of her 2007 Systers Pass-it-on Award. She and Ashley are also the video bloggers behind Ed & Ashley’s 5 Minute Show, where they have interviewed many technical women at Grace Hopper and other conferences.
To learn more about their project go to U.S. Imagine Cup’s People’s Choice Awards video gallery and click on LightAlert. And if you like what you see, consider voting for them by rating their video (the site allows you to repeat this every day between now and 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on Saturday, April 24, 2010).
The LightAlert project is getting some well-deserved attention and has been written up on Fast Company. I can’t wait to see what these young technical leaders come up with next.
Go Team MangoBunnies!
March 28th, 2010 at 6:06 pm
Social comments and analytics for this post…
This post was mentioned on Twitter by WomenofWeb: Go, MangoBunnies! Imagine Cup Team Fights Violence Against Women http://bit.ly/aUbK6l http://bit.ly/WoWeb...