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Gabriel Garcia Gonzalez, a UC Santa Cruz undergrad studying robotics engineering, claimed the top title the 2025 MESA Idea Accelerator alongside team members Alicia Gan of Southwestern College and Ameil Ramirez of Sacramento State.
The months-long business pitch competition empowers undergraduate students to become innovative entrepreneurs. Using the Human-Centered Design process, students gain the skills to create real-world solutions for their communities.
Gan, Gonzalez and Ramirez won first place with AGAR Watch, an affordable, fashionable and accurate two-way communication tool to improve accessibility for the deaf and signing community. The team won $3,000 to further their idea.
About thirty MESA students attended a boot-camp style training hosted by PG&E in August, acquiring the skills needed to inspire, ideate and implement their plans. They attended workshops on prototypes and presentation skill.
Following bootcamp, teams had periodic instruction with faculty and check-ins with each other. On November 6 teams gave final pitches to MESA Industry Advisory Board members and other industry volunteer judges prior to the MESA Student Leadership Conference.
As leaders among their MESA peers, Idea Accelerator students were invited to be team leaders at the conference and use the skills they had gained during the Accelerator to support others.
Winners were announced during the conference awards banquet on November 8 in front of more than 200 MESA undergraduate students, industry volunteers and MESA staff.
PG&E hosted and supported the program this year, and professionals from the following companies volunteered their times as judges: Meta, Sandia National Labs, Strava and Terumo Neuro.
MESA (Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement) guides first generation college-going students from low socio-economic backgrounds into STEM education and careers. MESA has a 55-year history of changing the face of science, technology and engineering by developing a new generation of STEM leaders.