Finalists Chosen in National Student Challenge to Design Apps to Remove Barriers to Degree Completion

Selected from 150+ submissions, three finalists presented their student-built apps live at Stellic Summit in Philadelphia in September

SAN MATEO, Calif., Oct. 13, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Stellic, the Bay Area-based developer of the academic planning and degree management platform used by more than 2 million students across 100 colleges and universities, today announced the winner of its Pathfinders Challenge, a competition inviting college students from schools in the U.S., Canada, Mexico, and Australia to design and build working solutions to problems they've personally experienced in their higher education journey. Launched in July in partnership with Anthropic and Lovable, the challenge gave students free access to Lovable's vibe-coding platform and the Claude API to design, build, and ship solutions to the problems they face while navigating their college journey.

The challenge drew 169 total submissions from students, and a panel of judges evaluated submissions on the strength of the problem being solved, potential for scaled impact, originality, design and user experience, and overall execution. From that pool, three teams were selected as finalists and presented their apps live in front of college leaders from across the country at Stellic's fifth annual Partner Summit in Philadelphia.

The 2026 Pathfinders Challenge winners are:

• First Place: Dormant — Created by Nathan Wituk from the University of Kansas, Dormant is a map-based app that helps students discover what's happening on campus each night and makes it less intimidating to show up. Designed deliberately without streaks, follower counts, or other habit-forming mechanics, Dormant aims to help students get off their screens.
• Finalist: Flightplan — Built by Colleen Zhang (Carnegie Mellon University), Oliver Gan (New York University), and Alex Zhong (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign), Flightplan is a personalized career-planning space that adapts to each student's goals, coursework, and interests rather than offering a one-size-fits-all dashboard. The app also builds in a dedicated visa timeline and eligibility guidance for international students, an often-overlooked factor in career planning, and pairs it all with an animated companion that keeps students engaged with their own goals.
• Finalist: Vivifi — Developed by Rachael Chung from Carnegie Mellon University, Vivifi turns a static course syllabus into a live gradebook and planning tool in minutes. Students upload a syllabus, and Vivifi extracts grade weighting, assignments, and office hours, then lets students model grade scenarios in plain language — while keeping the underlying math, not the AI, responsible for every calculation.

The three finalist teams competed for a $5,000 grand prize and a career conversation with Stellic's leadership team, with the two runner-up teams each earning $2,500. Category winners were also awarded $500 each. Every qualifying submission also earned its creator a digital badge for their professional portfolio.

To see full demos of the top three finalists and learn more about the submissions, please visit stellic.com/pathfinders.

About Stellic. Stellic is a leading student success and academic planning platform used by over 100 higher education institutions worldwide and more than 2 million students. The company empowers students, advisors, and administrators with modern tools to streamline degree progress, automate transfer evaluations, and make data-informed decisions that drive completion and engagement. Learn more at www.stellic.com.

SOURCE Stellic