Viva La Field Trip: Frip Co-Founder, Angela Choi discusses new Field Trip Planning App

Earlier this summer in June 2016, I had the chance to attend a pitch night in NYC for local founders and entrepreneurs. After being relatively underwhelmed by many of the presenters that evening, there was one pitch that jumped out to me and much of the audience. This the pitch came from the co-founders of Frip, an application that makes the process of planning a field trip more streamlined and enjoyable.

Aside from being crisp, polished and engaging of a scalable product with a potentially large market, Frip's co-founders, Angela Choi and Moustafa Elshaabiny are creating a platform which can enhance the education and early development of so many children. In an increasingly digital world where children may be more familiar with mobile apps and games than zoos and museums, Frip and similar products could become an important link between our youth and our most important educational/cultural institutions.

Angela and I have caught up for a Q&A about the background, inter-workings and significance of Frip on education and child development. Enjoy!

-------

Angela Choi pictured (second from the left) with her Frip teammates Kevin Navarra, Moustafa Elshaabiny, Julie Orelien, Karina Ortiz and Jean Peña

1. What problem does Frip solve for its market and how does it work?

Frip helps educators seamlessly discover and reserve field trips to enhance students’ learning experience. Simultaneously, Frip offers venues an all-in-one field trip management tool to view analytics, update their content and manage incoming requests from educators.

2. When and how did you come up with a solution for this problem?

My Co-Founder, Moustafa Elshaabiny, and I came up with this idea in November 2015. Having experienced difficulties planning field trips, I was frustrated with the very laborious, old-fashioned process.

That’s when the idea of Frip was born. We wanted to use technology to help overworked teachers plan field trips more efficiently and effectively, ultimately improving students’ experiences.

3. For you, what is it about field trips that you were willing to drop what you were doing and commit time to this product and platform?

As a former teacher, my favorite part of the job was going on field trips because students were able to make discoveries and connections to what they have learned in the classroom.

I looked forward to moments when students made these connections outside of the classroom.

With Frip, I want more teachers and students to experience amazing field trips. In my current role, I still help students expand their learning outside of the classroom, but in a different way and at a larger scale.

Above are screenshots of the mobile application UX which the Frip team is currently working on for IOS release by the end of this year

4. As of now, what are some of the big challenges for your team and your competitors in developing products like Frip?

One of our biggest challenges is dealing with a very heterogeneous community of venues. Educational destinations handle things like payment processing and scheduling slightly differently depending on their size and industry. Our product has to be very adaptive and flexible to meet their needs.

5. What's your role on the team?

I am the Co-Founder and Education Program Manager of Frip. I build partnerships and maintain relationships with schools, teachers, and venues.

6. Have you faced any personal hurdles in getting going on Frip? You ever feel like race or gender have affected your progress so far?

As a woman founder and entrepreneur, I attended many networking startup events and it was predominately male entrepreneurs. They were often shocked that I was a founder of my startup. It was also difficult to find investors and startup founders that looked like me-millennial, minority, and a woman.

Throughout my journey, I’ve encountered several incredible women-founded companies, female investors, and women entrepreneur mentors who have inspired me to continue to pursue entrepreneurship to change the narrative and engage more millennial women to become founders of their startups.

Frip Users enjoy useful search results / suggested field trip destinations such as The Bronx and and the Central Park Zoo as pictured above.

7. In regard to hurdles, do you have mentors or a professional ecosystem which have specifically help you and your team along? If so, how did you go about finding this support system?

We began our journey at the Zahn Innovation Center at The City College of New York by participating in their Startup Competition & Incubator/Accelerator.

Frip competed in the Women+Tech4NYC track of the competition, sponsored by Standard Chartered Bank, Kesia Hudson, the Program Manager for Women’s Entrepreneurship at the Zahn Center, along with the Program Assistant, Katherine Olives, were especially instrumental mentors.

They helped us find mentors who are in leadership, startup and business roles. Some of our mentors include:

- Kate Debold, Clifton Bartley, and Carolyn Sadler of BNY Mellon, who helped us craft our business plan;

- Joelle Musante, a serial entrepreneur and former startup founder at Payvment

- Jennifer Jones, Co-Founder and Managing Editor at Women You Should Know

- Matthew Washington, Deputy Borough President, Manhattan.

They all encouraged us to experiment, make mistakes, and try again.

8. Going back to education and Frip, what are some big picture lessons you have learned about childcare and education?

Every student has a different way of learning such as: visual, kinesthetic, auditory, etc. It’s important to differentiate the lesson and infuse a variety of ways to integrate these practices so that all students are engaged and understand the material. Field trips play an integral role in enhancing students’ learning experience.

Additionally, one practice I love about entrepreneurship is the culture of failing and trying again. Often times, in school settings, we don’t encourage our students to make mistakes. In entrepreneurship, it’s the norm to make mistakes, fail, and try again every day. It’s part of the learning process.

Frip Co-Founders, Moustafa and Angela mid-pitch (image taken from Twitter user, Kesia Hudson)

9. What are some realities or ideas you would like for our civic leaders and politicians to consider when it comes to youth and holistic education?

Exposing students to colleges and career choice field trips will spark students’ interest and empower them to pursue dreams that are otherwise not considered. Students need to experience these kinds of interactions at an early age, so they are better prepared for college and beyond.

Our mission is to make it so that every student in New York City, regardless of their socio-economic status, experiences opportunities to learn outside of the classroom.

10. Lastly, which application has been your favorite or a favorite of the Frip team as it relates to the development (process) of the platform?

The filtering! The ability to see filtered results that meet teachers specific needs is invaluable.

For instance, a special education teacher can filter the field trips' search results to see only the ones that offer special needs programs. Wondering if your students can eat lunch at the venue or not? You can filter for a cafeteria! Also, wheelchair accessibility is one of our key filters.

-----

Angela Choi is the founder of FripApp.com, a start-up which provides teachers and caretakers with an intuitive trip planning tool, as well as venues with a marketing and sales platform for their guests and visitors. You can follow Angela on Twitter at @AngelamChoi or follow the Frip team on their Twitter page [link].

Medvis Jackson is a web designer at Hindsite, curator at Kulchah and avid cricket fan. You can follow him @medvisjackson for his random thoughts.

#ideasinfocus #education