Our 2026 Scholar
Joseann

University Attended & Degree
New York Institute of Technology
Bachelor of Science in Computer Science
Concentration: Artificial Intelligence
Minor: Technology Entrepreneurship
Clubs and Leadership
Breakthrough tech
AI Program Fellow
NYIT First Generation Student Club
Vice President
Projects
AI Fall Studio Project
Breakthrough Tech
Lingo Quest
Case Study
More About Our 2026 Scholarship Winner
Describe your professional aspirations in business, especially if it relates to AI.
My goal is to become an AI Product Manager at a fintech or enterprise technology company, where I can shape products that are not only intelligent, but equitable and accessible.
I want to build and bring to market AI products that lower barriers, whether that means democratizing access to financial tools, personalizing learning experiences, or helping underserved communities navigate complex systems.
Recount your professional experiences and reflect how AI has shaped them.
When I built Schomoply, a mobile admissions platform to centralize secondary school registration for over 1,000 students across Trinidad and Tobago in high school, I saw firsthand how a simple, well-designed product could remove real friction from people's lives. When I co-designed Access Aid, a crowdsourced urban transportation platform, and advanced to the top 8 of 20 teams in the MLT Ideathon, I understood that community-centered innovation is a competitive advantage, not a compromise.
Professionally, I have had the opportunity to bring this philosophy into real environments. At Apollo Global Management, I collaborated with cross-functional teams to design and deploy an AI agent for automated document processing, driving a 4x improvement in operational efficiency. This coming summer, I will join FICO as a Technical Product Marketing Intern, translating complex AI features into clear, customer-centric value, directly at the intersection of AI and financial technology.
What ideas do you have for using AI to make a positive impact?
The idea I am most actively developing is the Inter-Regional Movement Planner, a web platform I built to help CARICOM citizens navigate the complex, often opaque process of cross-border work migration. It was awarded a gold medal by the Caribbean Science Foundation among competitors from nine nations, and it is now being developed into an investor-ready AI venture through the Technovation AI Ventures Accelerator, where I am competing for $10,000 in equity- free seed funding among 1,000+ participants worldwide.
The problem is structural: the Caribbean Community allows freedom of movement for skilled workers across member states, but in practice, the process is fragmented, paperwork-heavy, and deeply inaccessible, especially for workers without formal legal or financial guidance. My platform uses AI to personalize the migration journey: surfacing the right documentation requirements by country and profession, flagging eligibility criteria, and guiding users step by step through a process that currently requires navigating dozens of disconnected government websites.
How do you see AI tools driving positive change to the world in the near future?
AI as an equalizer for people navigating systems built without them in mind. Whether it is a first-generation student trying to understand financial aid, a small business owner in an underserved community trying to access credit, or a migrant worker trying to understand their rights, there are millions of people interacting with systems that are complex by design. AI, applied thoughtfully and with genuine user
research, can be the translator, the guide, and the advocate that these systems have never provided. The through-line in all of my work is using AI not as a novelty, but as infrastructure for access.
