Internship Description
Ingrid Keppe '20 interned with the MIND Research Institute, an independent nonprofit that uses the experiential learning approach to develop innovative, visually-based software games. MIND's mission is to impact students today so they can change the world tomorrow. Ingrid will be an intern in the social impact team and the focus of her project will be on research and strategy development for current and prospective donors.
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Ingrid Keppe ’20 interned with Applied XL, a data science startup building artificial intelligence tools to help track the health of people and places, with the mission of providing ground truth for leaders charting a new path to a resilient and sustainable future post-COVID-19. Ingrid served as the data partnerships intern, helping to expand Applied XL’s footprint in sustainability and economic resilience projects by developing and executing the strategy for new customer acquisition across sectors.
I did my summer fellowship at MIND Research Institute, an independent nonprofit that uses the experiential learning approach to improve the experience of learning math for children through software games. I worked with the social impact team and my main project was to analyze data on prospective and current donors. My goal was to get a better understanding of which possible donors to approach and how to build a stronger strategy based on the data available.
In order to succeed in my projects, I used technical and strategic concepts that I learned during my Columbia MBA. The technical skills helped me dive into a lot of data from different systems and be able to extract important information from it. The strategic skills helped me understand patterns from current and prospective donors and develop strategic recommendations.
The main challenge that I faced was getting a better understanding of the nonprofit grants world and how it specifically impacted Education. My team was great on getting me onboard, I had one-on-one calls with each team member so they would explain to me exactly what they did and how the company and processes works.
My main takeaway from the experience is that working for a nonprofit is quite similar to working for the private companies I have worked in the past, but you get a unique rewarding feeling every day. Helping build the strategy for a company that I know will have such an important impact on millions of young children was an amazing experience. I hope that my projects will help more schools and children get access to a better-quality learning and diminish the learning gap.
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I did my summer fellowship at AppliedXL, a startup that uses data science to measure the health of people, places, and the planet. I worked mainly with the founder, the CEO, and other interns. My most important projects were developing market research and business plans for the two leading products of the startup. My goal was to offer a better understanding of the current market and competitors, and to provide strategic recommendations for both products.
To have better performance during my internship, I used both strategic and technical concepts that I learned during my MBA at Columbia. The strategic skills allowed me to offer data-driven recommendations. The technical skills helped me evaluate data from different sources and competitors and build a model to compare these inputs and generate insights.
The main challenge that I faced was to adapt my work style to a dynamic and fast-paced culture. I have never worked in a startup before, so it was important to learn how to deal with pressing matters and lack of initial structure and processes. The team was great on helping me get a better understanding of both the startup and data science worlds.
My main takeaway from my summer internship is that the lack of structure that most startups have at initial stages is great for developing different products and quickly improve their quality to best fit their clients’ needs. I hope that my internship will help generate positive environmental and social impact.