The $1,000 App Quote That Changed My Life

In 2017, I was a Business major at BYU-Hawaii, competing in the Great Idea Competition. My team had a concept for a mobile app to help people experiencing homelessness find jobs as tour guides.

We reached the Top 6, but during the Q&A, a judge from Tesla asked:

"Who is going to build the app? I don’t see a developer on your team."

I confidently replied that we would pay a developer $1,000 with the prize money. The judge's response hit me like a ton of bricks: "There's no developer who can build an app like that for $1,000."

The Turning Point

That public failure revealed a hard truth: I had always avoided Computer Science because I didn't think I had a "talent" for math. I tried to find a student who could build it for me, but no one could.

So, I made a choice: I would learn to build it myself.

The Evolution

What started as a response to failure became a passion. I signed up for an intro programming course, earn my best academic score ever, and eventually transferred to BYU to major in Computer Science with a focus on AI and Data Science.

Turning Fear into Expertise:

• Math & Statistics: Once a fear, now the foundation of my work.
• Software Engineering: From knowing nothing to leading teams of 10+.
• ML & Vision: Mastering the tools to build the "impossible."

Failure wasn't a setback—it was the redirection I needed to become an engineer.