Innovation: Momentum app
Changemaker: Janoye Williams

Janoye Williams is in the process of developing and launching an app to help high school students advance their education and careers. Williams connected with Childhood Prosperity Lab to share more information about his innovation, the challenges he has faced, and the progress he has made in moving his project forward. Learn more:

Describe the problem the Momentum app seeks to address.
High school students, especially those from low-income families, usually have a difficult time finding resources to advance their education and career, including important information about community scholarships or occupation training opportunities. In addition, many community scholarship opportunities or local career programs cannot find enough eligible participants. As a result, these local resources remain underutilized, while low-income youth miss the education and career opportunities to break the poverty cycle. Our preliminary market research confirms the adverse impact of the disconnection between high school students and local resources. In Hartford, we found 50% of high school students are not going to college and only 70% of the students who enrolled in their first semester actually attend the college in the following semester.

Describe how the Momentum app helps children flourish, thrive, and succeed (i.e. core components and structural requirements).
The Momentum app is a platform that will connect local high school students to local community resources aimed to assist them in education, employment, and mentoring opportunities. Some would coin our app as the “LinkedIn for Kids”. The app will launch in Hartford and students will have opportunities to connect with resources in Hartford County free of charge. Students will earn app currency for interaction and usage of the app. They can use app currency to purchase user-relevant items donated from our partners on the app.

Describe how you assess or will assess the impact of the Momentum app.
We will assess the impact of the Momentum app by evaluating:

  • The number of new resources created based on needs identified by students
  • Increased participation in programs and services offered by organizations
  • Increased utilization of resources offered by organizations
  • Increased graduation rates for a given city or town
  • The number of scholarships and total dollar amount earned within a given city or town
  • The employment rate for students between the ages of 16 and 18
  • Decreased youth crime rate

What value did you gain from engaging with Childhood Prosperity Lab?
We received great feedback from Childhood Prosperity Lab, which included advice to develop a logic model and theory of change to substantiate our innovation. We also received great networking and exposure for our team and innovation.

Learn more about the Momentum app:
You can find out more information about the app on the Momentum website. You can also follow the company on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn and use their favorite hashtags: #momentumapp, #joinmomentum, and #joinmomentumapp.