COUNTRY DigitaLab interns win hackathon award

COUNTRY DigitaLab interns pictured left to right: Elijah Mock, Ben Park, Shivam Patel, Abhi Ramakrishnan, Shiyuan Liu

July 25, 2024

COUNTRY Financial® DigitaLab Interns Win Award in University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign Research Park Hackathon

COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab interns showcased their innovative skills and earned an award for Skillful Execution at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign Research Park Hackathon.

During the 15-hour hackathon, participating teams from other companies followed the prompt “Bring Your Own Data.” The group of COUNTRY Financial interns, who gave themselves the team name “COUNTRYmen,” created a platform named GeoGroove which connects music and location. Users can input their desired locations and GeoGroove creates playlists featuring artists local to those areas so the user can experience the culture of the place he or she visits.

“This competitive Hackathon solidified our team bond as we immersed ourselves in an exciting project from start to finish,” said DigitaLab intern Ben Park. “After this engaging experience, I’ve noticed how we collaborate more naturally since we better understand and appreciate each other’s strengths.”

The COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab is an immersive data science and technology program developed in partnership with the University of Illinois, and is located at the Research Park of University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana. Interns work on projects that focus on:

Creating new technology by working with AI, cloud computing and other tools.
Merging classroom and real-world experience to put prototypes into production.
Enhancing technical skills and growing soft skills needed for corporate environments.
Working in cross-functional teams to learn with peers from all walks of life.

“It’s great to see the interns come together to ideate, design and implement an idea in such a short period of time. Research Park does an amazing job coordinating these events so that interns across the companies have a fun summer experience while enhancing their skills at the same time,” said Julia Hart, DigitaLab Site Director.

Learn more about the COUNTRY Financial DigitaLab.