Zoom to Class wins Rep. Nikema Williams’ (GA-05) 2020 Congressional App Challenge

When asked what inspired the creation of Zoom to Class, the student said, “At first, I was simply creating this app for myself. The Zoom links for each of my classes had been sent to me in an email by a school administrator. I starred this email to make my life a little bit easier. However, before each class, I still had to open up my email, go to the starred emails, select the one with my zoom links, scroll to the right link, and click on it. But that’s 5 steps! 5 times each day! As an efficiency-loving programmer, I simply had to fix this.”

Over 6,500 students registered for the 2020 Congressional App Challenge. These students created and submitted 3,088 functioning apps, marking the end of an extremely successful Congressional App Challenge amid the COVID-19 pandemic. All told, 308 Members of Congress hosted Congressional App Challenges in their districts across 49 states, Puerto Rico, the Mariana Islands, and Washington, DC.

The CAC is an initiative of the U.S. House of Representatives, where Members of Congress host competitions in their districts for middle school and high school students, encouraging them to learn to code and inspiring them to pursue careers in computer science. The Internet Education Foundation provides the CAC with supplemental support. In the six years of the Congressional App Challenge, thousands of functional apps have been created by over 30,000 students, and participant demographics surpass all industry diversity metrics.