A Day in The Life of A Student Founder at a Pitch Competition: 2024 ACC InVenture Prize - Day 1

This past March, the Aurganics team and I had the pleasure of representing my alma mater, Duke University, at the 2024 ACC InVenture Prize Competition at Florida State University in Tallahassee, FL. The competition was super exciting (it was literally filmed and broadcast LIVE on TV!!), and honestly, even though the entire week leading up to the event was chaotic, it was SO fun!

Aurganics was featured on the ACC website (watch our pitch here!) and we got to meet X other student ventures from other ACC-affiliated universities. I got to end the competition celebrating with my team (and we all got a free trip to Tallahassee ;)).

As I take this moment to reflect on where Aurganics is now since graduating from Duke and going full-time, I’m reminded of last summer, when I first started building my team. I was nervous to put my baby in the hands of other people, but I knew it was necessary if I really wanted to start growing the company beyond just me. Sammy and Edwin, the two teammates I brought with me to ACC, were some of the first people I brought onto the team, and I am so glad I did. Seriously, one of my best decisions yet.

Building a team showed me that oh sh*t – maybe I am actually capable of building something bigger than myself. Maybe Aurganics is onto something. 

Spoiler alert: We are.

This experience was too good not to document – so join me (and my team) as a student founder for Day 1 of the 2024 ACC InVenture Prize Pitch Competition! Here’s an hour-by-hour breakdown of what we did (with pics):

Aurganics x 2024 ACC InVenture Prize Competition: Day 1 – The Final Countdown

6:00 AM

Our day started bright-and-early at Raleigh-Durham International Airport, aka RDU. Our flight was delayed (to the surprise of no one), so I decided to pop over to the nearby restaurant and get some (overrated, overpriced) grub.

4:30 PM

We landed in Tallahassee, Florida, and were greeted with a Cadillac escort to drop us off at the Hampton Inn hotel.

5:30 PM

We arrived to the hotel and the running around commenced. Since our flight was delayed, we had to get ready QUICK for our first event – dinner!

6:00 PM

We went to dinner at the Jim Moran College of Entrepreneurship, where we met some of the other teams and heard from our keynote speakers, Luis Blanco and John Wilcox, the co-founders of Diatech Diabetes, a company developing medical software products that enhance the quality of life for people living with diabetes! It was so inspiring to hear their stories about how they built their company from the ground up while navigating unexpected challenges.

7:30 PM

Immediately after dinner (no rest for the weary), we headed to WFSU Studios for our blocking rehearsal! Not gonna lie, this was my first time behind the scenes of a TV set, so I was HYPE.

8:00 PM

We spent the next two hours doing our blocking rehearsal with Fineline Productions. This part was a LOT more boring than I expected – lots of standing around, listening, walking back and forth to our positions, not going over the white line, ya know… just normal TV things.

I’d watched some of the prior competitions, but seeing everything up close and personal like that was really, really cool. Around this time, it started hitting me that tomorrow, I was literally gonna be on TV pitching my company for the world to see. (Maybe that sounds dramatic, but that’s how it felt, okay?!)

Okay, okay… so maybe we did have a little mini photoshoot. Shoutout to Sasha Surkin (Weyeze) from UNC, our designated college rival/photographer.

10:00 PM

We bussed back to the hotel, and it was time for bed! We were absolutely beat, and knew we had a 6 AM wakeup (and TV appearance) the next day so… we needed all the sleep we could get. I did run through the pitch once or twice though – just to make sure.

Stay tuned for Day 2!