The Population Health Initiative’s Summer 2026 Social Entrepreneurship Fellows Program concluded in August with a showcase in which fellows presented their findings to students, faculty and staff from schools and colleges across the University of Washington.
Over 10 weeks, the fellows worked on population health innovations developed by UW researchers, evaluating pathways to financial sustainability while maximizing societal impact.
Developed by the Population Health Initiative in partnership with the Buerk Center for Entrepreneurship and CoMotion, the Social Entrepreneurship Fellows Program expands opportunities for students across disciplines to gain real-world experience in social entrepreneurship while providing UW investigators with roadmaps for sustaining their population health innovations.
This summer’s fellows were:
| Name | School | Program |
| Cris Resto | School of Public Health | Master of Public Health, Nutrition & Dietetics |
| Ankit Azad | Foster School of Business | Master of Business Administration |
| Seirina Zhang | College of Engineering | Master of Science in Human Centered Design & Engineering |
| Lee Donnelly | College of Arts & Sciences | Master of Arts in Cinema & Media Studies |
The fellows’ final presentations and reports provided UW investigators with detailed analyses of customer discovery, market opportunities, competitive landscapes, and recommended business models to advance their projects.
Resto worked on Nuestro Valor, a system of evidence-based interventions designed to address behavioral, social, environmental and structural factors affecting Latino communities, particularly by improving access to fresh produce through tiendas. Through market research and stakeholder interviews, she recommended starting small and testing the concept’s value through shared purchasing models, leveraging existing infrastructure, and building toward earned revenue by demonstrating cost savings for tienda owners. To help move the project from pilot to sustainable implementation, Resto developed a roadmap outlining goals, key tasks and potential funding sources to support Nuestro Valor’s long-term financial viability.
Azad was paired with the Otobuds (TUNE) team. Otobuds is a low-cost, smartphone-based hearing screening device designed to support the early detection of hearing loss. During the 10-week fellowship, Azad examined the project’s limitations and growth opportunities through stakeholder interviews and market research, including an assessment of competitors and regulatory considerations. Her recommendations included pursuing targeted funding strategies, scaling through existing partnerships, thoughtfully building leadership and technical capacity, and validating the technology in real-world clinical settings.
SMART-Wrap (Short Message Assisted Responsive Treatment for Wraparound) was created to bridge the gap between care intentions and care realities through a real-time, easy-to-use, text-based communication tool for youth and families. Zhang conducted 18 customer discovery interviews, assessed funding and sustainability opportunities, and proposed a service model that incorporated family feedback, data interpretation, staff recognition and funder-ready evidence translation. She also evaluated potential buyers and overall market fit while considering ethical guardrails and preliminary pricing models. Her final recommendations included reframing the program’s language to focus on the people doing the work and piloting the system with five organizations to assess the benefits they experience.
Donnelly spent the summer investigating aFloats (Acoustic Micro-float), a cost-effective volumetric acoustic measurement system that integrates hydrophones with profiling floats to map underwater soundscapes. As part of her customer discovery work, Donnelly conducted 25 stakeholder interviews and identified potential funding pathways, strategies to improve search engine visibility, branding assets, and opportunities for continued customer discovery. She also identified commercial and social-impact markets for future exploration. Her final recommendations included expanding into European markets, exploring tribal and state governments as potential customers, investing in real-time detection capabilities, and addressing potential education and awareness gaps.
While each fellow had primary responsibility for a single project, the cohort model enabled students to collaborate closely and contribute their disciplinary expertise across all projects.