immi | Devpost

immi (Figma)

Source of Inspiration

Growing up in New York City as first-generation college students was challenging, but even more stressful was the responsibility of translating and interpreting documents for our parents since childhood. Sharing our experiences inspired us to delve deeper into our struggles. Discovering that child language brokering, prevalent in a city with one of the largest immigrant populations, was linked to increased depression and anxiety in human development broke our hearts. As the immigrant population continues to grow in NYC, we aspire to change this trajectory for future generations.

Functionality

Immi facilitates connections between non-English speaking immigrants in NYC and experienced volunteers or professionals. Users can select their preferred service provider based on offered services and pricing, from simple tasks like translating mail to complex ones like completing documents. Given that many immigrant groups today lack familiarity with technology, we often find ourselves teaching our parents how to navigate devices with limited understanding. Immi bridges this gap by linking parents to volunteers or professionals who can communicate tech concepts clearly. Additionally, we've integrated a volunteer system to assist this user group in navigating life in NYC and advocating for improved mental health for future first-generation children.

Development Process

During our development process, we extensively researched the market by immersing ourselves in the stories of other first-generation Americans growing up with immigrant parents in New York City. This allowed us to gain valuable insights into the specific challenges and needs of our target demographic. Additionally, we leveraged data from NYC government reports and mental health studies to inform our product development strategy. This research provided us with a deeper understanding of how to create a product tailored to advocating for positive mental health while remaining accessible to non-tech-savvy users.

Challenges Faced

Our primary challenge as a team was organizing our ideas into a feasible roadmap within the two-day time frame. As newcomers to hackathons, mastering Figma and developing our product without explicit guidance proved challenging.

Achievements

Creating a product aligned with our passions is a source of pride for us. Our shared experiences as first-generation Americans and college students served as the foundation for this project. Despite the steep learning curve of using Figma collaboratively, we're thrilled to have submitted a creative video presentation, marking a new milestone in our collaboration. The journey of crafting this passion project over the past two days has been immensely enjoyable, filled with laughter and camaraderie.

Lessons Learned

One of the most significant lessons we learned throughout this process was the importance of adaptability and resilience. Despite encountering challenges such as mastering new tools like Figma and navigating the constraints of a hackathon, we remained flexible and persevered. We discovered that successful product development requires not only technical skills but also the ability to collaborate effectively as a team and adapt to unforeseen circumstances. This experience taught us the value of resilience in the face of adversity and the importance of maintaining a growth mindset when tackling unfamiliar tasks.

Future Prospects for Immi

Our vision for Immi is to establish partnerships with NYC.gov resources. Collaboration with the city would provide incentives and avenues for giving back to the volunteer and professional communities pivotal to our product's success. Furthermore, we aim to collaborate with related resources such as AccessNYC and WeSpeak NYC to foster a more robust community for immigrants and first-generation Americans.