Check out the Virtual Career Guide AILY ROJAN S1-S4 DMONDAY, APRIL 19, 2021 | STUDENT NEWSPAPER OF THET UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA SINCE 1912 | VOL. 202, NO. 23 Sophomore wins competition with her proposal for a cashless donation system Neha Halebleed was one of the Halebleed said. Halebleed proposed two stag- two USC students who won After talking with her father, es in her paper. Stage one involves JP Halebleed, when she first had asking smaller businesses to place the Reimagine Challenge 2020. the idea of creating a cashless do- QR codes around their area for in- nation system, he told her to look dividuals to donate through the By SYDNEY FIORENTINO into companies already doing this. Giving Streets app to a partner Staff Writer This led her to find Giving Streets. organization helping those expe- Giving Streets is an app riencing homelessness. Stage two Growing up in Atlanta, Ga., launched in Greece that allows involves implementing QR codes Neha Halebleed remembers seeing users to scan a QR code to do- associated with specific people people experiencing homelessness nate directly to an organiza- experiencing homelessness to re- and wanting to find a way to tion. Halebleed said she found ceive the money directly. help out, despite never carrying the app as a solution to donate to While Halebleed has reached cash on her. As a rising college the houseless population in the out to multiple partnering organi- freshman, Halebleed developed a United States, in hopes to encour- zations that have expressed inter- proposal for a cashless donation age donations as the world moves est in the first stage of her project, system, which she later submitted into a cashless society. She mes- the Weingartz Center, an organi- to the Reimagine Challenge 2020 saged the founders of the app zation that builds and provides last fall. Out of 838 submissions, through LinkedIn two days af- services for people experiencing Halebleed was one of the 20 ter finding the company, and ex- homelessness in the Los Angeles winners. plained her idea to bring the app area, is her biggest partner so far. While Halebleed — now a into U.S. app stores. When reaching out to partner- sophomore majoring in communi- Halebleed’s father said he is ing organizations, Halebleed said cation and specializing in applied proud of his daughter’s accom- she set up calls to discuss her pro- analytics and innovation — has plishment and what she has done posal and received feedback from long wanted to help those expe- so far with Giving Streets. JP said potential partners about imple- riencing homelessness, she said that when his daughter developed menting stage two. the pandemic made her idea for this project just before her fresh- “I want to hear input [about a cashless donation system even man year at USC, he was there stage two and donating directly more necessary. to ask her questions and get her to a person] — even if it’s nega- As the coronavirus made peo- thinking. tive input — because I obviously ple nervous to touch surfaces, “I [was] more of a sounding don’t want to put something into Halebleed wanted to develop a board, I would say. I would [ask] existence that’s going to harm the touch-free solution similar to questions a lot … There are orga- people I’m trying to help or the Venmo that could directly trans- nizations that already [exist] ... people that we’re trying to help,” fer money between people. She Photo courtesy of Neha Halebleed you don’t want to create anoth- Halebleed said. “I think the QR later realized not everyone had ac- Neha Halebleed’s er organization to do the same code solution directly to people is proposal involves the app Giving Streets, which cess to a mobile device to receive thing,” JP said. very tricky, but also really reliant allows users to scan a QR code to make direct donations to organizations. funds, so she thought of imple- In September, Halebleed said on where the people are located.” menting QR codes. out to her through email in of this project,’” Pearl said. “‘Let’s she initially decided to enter the For the second stage of her “It’s good to know that people October. Halebleed asked for help actually talk about what this proj- Reimagine Challenge — a chal- proposal, Halebleed also received think that the idea is important as with the legality of marketplaces ect is doing in relation to the un- lenge where university students help from USC professors, such as we transition to a cashless society, for social enterprises and wanted housed community in ways that submit solutions to movements Tom Sloper, professor of informa- which has its challenges, especial- referrals to professionals in might potentially be harmful, or problems — after receiving an tion technology, who helped out- ly as it marginalizes certain com- the mobile payment or legal even though it’s intended to be the email about it from USC. After lined her plan for this project, and munities — not just people expe- industries. opposite.’” submitting a four-page short pro- Ali Rachel Pearl, who helped her riencing homlessness, but also “I stepped in and said, ‘I think After Halebleed presented her posal, she was invited back to a think about the project’s ethical undocumented [people] and also before you go to that level, we project to Pearl, the two talked second round in which she wrote implications. people who rely on cash to pay less should take a step back and think about design justice principles, a 12-page proposal outlining her Pearl was Halebleed’s professor taxes, such as small businesses,” about the ethical considerations | see , page | idea. last spring, and Halebleed reached REIMAGINE 2 Lorem ipsum COVID-19 AT USC — April 4-April 10 Over the week of April 4 - April 10, the test positivity rate for PCR testing was 0.2% among students and 0.1% among employees. CURRENT TESTING NUMBERS Between April 4 and April 10, PCR SURVEILLANCE TESTING USC’s Keck School of Medicine administered 10,692 PCR tests among students and employees. The results from all diagnostic tests, both surveillance and symptomatic, NEGATIVE: 7,026 NEGATIVE: 3,705 are now streamlined into one POSITIVE: 17 POSITIVE: 3 positivity rate statistic. The will report the STUDENTS Daily Trojan EMPLOYEES results every week on Sunday and can also be found on USC’s COVID-19 Dashboard. INDEX 2 · News 3 · Opinion 4 · A & E 6 · Classifieds 9 · Sudoku 10 · Sports DAILYTROJAN.COM DAILYTROJAN PAGE 2 APRIL 19, 2021 | WWW.DAILYTROJAN.COM NEWS REIMAGINE | continued from page 1 | Freshman joins APIDA coalition Halebleed’s approach to commu- nity engagement, and discussed in the news [and] what you’re As the USC representative, books and other resources that seeing on social media,” said Yi-Ann Li advocates for Abigail Jiang, a sophomore at the could be helpful for Halebleed’s Asian collegiate students. California Institute of Technology idea. majoring in material science. “Our “I love how invested she is in goal so far has been to address using her talents to address social By SARAH HENDARTONO these incidents on our campuses, Staff WRITER through our campuses, [by] talk- issues,” Pearl wrote in an email to With the recent rise in hate ing to administration and trying the Daily Trojan. “I hope she con- crimes against Asians and Asian to do collaborative work.” tinues to be curious about the Americans, Yi-Ann Li found that One way the ICAC has worked most ethical ways to address the now, more than ever, is an im- to achieve their goal is by releas- needs of a community she is not portant time to advocate for the ing a statement of specified de- Asian community. So when Li, a mands directed towards univer- part of.” freshman majoring in psychology, sities to fight against Asian hate. Timothy Li, a part-time lec- heard about a new opportunity for Kesavan Srivilliputhu, a sopho- turer of information technology, advocacy with the Intercollegiate more at Princeton University ma- is another one of Halebleed’s pro- joring in chemistry who co-led APIDA Coalition, she knew she fessors who provided guidance on wanted to get involved. the writing of the statement, said The ICAC consists of col- that there was tension during the her proposal. He said he believes lege Asian Pacific Islander Desi process of writing, as a range of Halebleed’s project deserves the American student groups across progressive political views were attention of a wider audience and the country aiming to fight represented and many organiza- that Halebleed will lead the way tions weren’t allowed to endorse against anti-Asian racism and the in delivering resources to those rise in violence directed at Asian anything partisan. communities. As USC’s represen- “We focused our demands on in need. tative to the coalition, Li brings universities because that also While Halebleed is glad she her perspective on what USC helped us keep away from more can help generate resources for could do to better support the national politics and partisan- individuals experiencing home- Asian community and compares ship,” Srivilliputhu said. lessness, she recognizes the is- this to actions taken at other uni- Demands include calling for versities. The coalition’s discus- universities to release a statement sue itself stems from overarch- sions ultimately contribute to condemning the violence and rac- ing problems such as systemic the “overarching perspective” on ism against Asians and Asian racism that require policy chang- Photo courtesy of Yi-Ann Li what universities can do to bet- Americans, offer Asian American es beyond the scope of the app.