Melissa & Doug Entrepreneurs is Duke\u2019s premier program for student entrepreneurs. The highly selective, year-long, non-credit program is open to students who are actively building ventures and want to grow as effective founders.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe program is for students who have started something real \u2014 and are looking to join a community of Duke\u2019s top\u00a0founders, focused on growing their ventures, accelerating their impact, and becoming exactly what their startup needs to succeed,\u201d said Amy Linnane<\/a>, managing director of co-curricular programs at Duke I&E.\u00a0\u200b<\/p>\n Since its inception, 150 students have participated in the program.\u00a0Forty-two of the ventures are still in operation, and more than \u201c16 had exits,\u201d Linnane said, meaning the ventures were acquired.<\/p>\n A diverse set of students from multiple Duke degree programs and class years are part of the 12-member, 2025-2026 cohort<\/a>.<\/p>\n Graduate student Ewan Bradley points to the importance of the I&E network, whose members offer advice and connections to the student founders during one-on-one meetings. \u201cI\u2019ve met a bunch of different founders who \u2026 come from different business backgrounds and have different business ideas, but we have the shared (experience) of what it means to build your own thing, and to build your own startup to solve problems in society.\u201d<\/p>\n The Melissa & Doug Entrepreneurs program supports students in other ways, including funding, mentorships, faculty expertise and an ecosystem where student entrepreneurs connect with their peers and form lasting friendships.<\/p>\n \u201c(The program) is without a doubt, one of the most pivotal things I\u2019ve ever experienced,\u201d said senior Sydelle Bernstein, who is a daughter of Melissa and Doug, adding that it \u201cgave me the most incredible community of other founders who have introduced me to their founder friends,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Junior Avihan Jain pointed to courses where he was assisted by \u201cteam members from the business school, from the graduate school and from the undergraduate school\u201d who helped advance his business idea.<\/p>\n Damilola \u201cDami\u201d Awofisayo, a senior, offered advice to students who are considering starting a new venture, with passion being key. \u201cI would highly, highly say, don\u2019t start a startup just for the sake of starting one.\u201d She described the student founders as a \u201cpassionate community\u201d whose zeal for their ventures fuels the journey from an idea to a sustainable product in the marketplace.<\/p>\n Playerbase<\/p>\n Last year, at the beginning of the fall semester, Awofisayo, a computer science major, co-founded Playerbase, a platform that helps college coaches and recruiters identify promising high school athletes.<\/p>\n Awofisayo credits co-founder Marquist Allen, a graduate of Dartmouth College and member of the school\u2019s football team, with the idea for Playerbase to address a recruiting system that hinders mid-major universities that may not have lucrative recruiting budgets.<\/p>\n The co-founders talked to college coaches for nearly a year and identified two issues, a \u201cdata problem\u201d and a \u201cdiscovery problem.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n The data issue considers quantitative information such as health records, height, weight, sprint times, bench press capabilities, points per game and touchdowns.<\/p>\n \u201cSome of it is verifiable. Some of it is not,\u201d explained Awofisayo, who added that Playerbase relies on AI to search disparate data sources to determine intangibles such as whether an athlete is a team player or has leadership abilities.<\/p>\n Awofisayo is a native of Alexandria, Va., where she grew up playing sports. She describes Playerbase as a cross between LinkedIn and a complex enterprise data tool.<\/p>\n In recent months, the co-founders have piloted the platform with multiple small college programs and several Division I volleyball teams. These live tests have generated direct coach feedback, repeat usage, and validation of the platform\u2019s recruiting workflow, demonstrating early product-market fit and strong institutional interest.<\/p>\n The goal is to see measurable success to provide sports organizations over \u201ca long-standing period,\u201d Awofisayo said.<\/p>\n Students Who Sit<\/p>\n Growing up in Connecticut as one of six children, babysitting not only enabled\u00a0Sydelle\u00a0Bernstein\u00a0to earn money \u2014 it was her passion.<\/p>\n That passion began with Bernstein looking after siblings. (Some of her siblings are also Blue Devils.) \u201cI became a nurturer early on,\u201d said Bernstein. \u201cBabysitting my siblings wasn\u2019t a chore; it was genuinely my favorite hobby. Taking care of them felt instinctive and joyful.\u201d<\/p>\n When\u00a0Bernstein\u00a0arrived at Duke, the senior psychology major struggled to find opportunities to continue doing the thing that she loved. She also observed that faculty members and campus staff struggled to find reliable babysitters.\u00a0\u201cI saw professors bringing kids to campus because they couldn\u2019t find someone trustworthy to take care of their kids,\u201d\u00a0Bernstein said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Bernstein\u00a0explored babysitting opportunities through existing online platforms and ended up at homes babysitting for people she didn\u2019t know or had mutual connections with. Sometimes it didn\u2019t feel comfortable or safe.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd it came to me, that hey, you know, there are these two underserved communities on campus,\u201d she said. \u201cThere are students like me, who are looking for opportunities to work with kids, and parents who can\u2019t find sitters, all within the same community. It feels seamless to connect the two through a platform.\u201d<\/p>\n Students Who Sit officially launched in the fall of 2024. From the onset, the need was immediately evident. The venture\u2019s first month saw child-sitting volume grow from three to 100 sessions.<\/p>\n In April 2025, during her junior year,\u00a0Bernstein\u00a0was invited to pitch Students Who Sit<\/a>, a venture she thought could solve this two-sided problem, at the third annual\u00a0Student Startup Showcase<\/a>\u00a0hosted by Duke I&E.<\/p>\n At that point, she did not see herself as a founder. \u201cI just had an idea,\u201d she said. \u201dBut I had built this team around me,\u00a0including Ann Marie Flusche<\/a>, a founding member,\u00a0to help establish the groundwork and foundation of what could be a business.\u201d<\/p>\n She took home the Borchardt Runner-up Prize of $10,000, awarded to\u00a0the most promising\u00a0undergraduate student venture.\u00a0<\/p>\n Last July,\u00a0Bernstein\u00a0was accepted into the Melissa & Doug Entrepreneurs program. Today, Students Who Sit has more than 1,200 registered users at Duke and has launched expansion efforts at college campuses regionally and nationally.\u00a0<\/p>\n Movement Intelligence with Jeani<\/p>\n Pain and injury are as much a part of sports as victory and defeat.\u00a0<\/p>\n Ewan Bradley, a Duke graduate student in global health and member of Duke University\u2019s track and field team, knows all too well about pain and injuries.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m 23 and there are not too many parts of my body that I\u2019ve not injured,\u201d said Bradley, a track and field decathlete who will earn a master\u2019s of science degree in May.\u00a0<\/p>\n A year ago, Bradley and his teammates Stuart Bladon<\/a> and Michael Bennett<\/a> were in a training room submerged in ice baths when they considered the gap in wearable tech. They believe the gap exists in monitoring musculoskeletal health; products currently available typically measure only heart rate, sleep and stress.<\/p>\n \u201cBut we really felt as athletes, they missed [the] biggest part of the puzzle, which is how much you\u2019re moving and how you\u2019re moving,\u201d Bradley said. \u201cAnd whether or not there are imbalances in your movement that are contributing to injury risk long-term.\u201d<\/p>\n Ewan, Blandon and Bennett decided they would build something that measured musculoskeletal health. They developed \u00a0\u201cJeani<\/a>,\u201d a new AI platform that enhances movement, performance, and quality of life through personalized, real-time musculoskeletal monitoring, predictive analytics<\/a> \u2014 which forecasts future outcomes, behaviors and trends \u2014 along with targeted exercise prescription.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was essentially something we needed in the early stages of our (athletic) careers, and that we wanted to build something to help people like ourselves to be more active,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd then we realized that it expands beyond just athletes. It expands to anyone who wants to be physically active, whether you\u2019re 16 or whether you\u2019re 50.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/1772000201_725_2.jpg\")
Playerbase co-founder Dami Awofisayo says the platform aims to help colleges with limited budgets recruit promising athletes.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/5.jpg\")
Students Who Sit co-founder Sydelle Bernstein (left) with partner Ann Marie Flushche. The venture connects college students who babysit with parents who need reliable babysitters.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/1772000203_734_3.jpg\")
Jeani co-founder Ewan Bradley says the new wearable tech AI platform aims to help prevent long-term injury risks.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/1772000204_963_4.jpg\")
Avihan Jain was motivated by studies that determined children who learn a second language before the age of seven are likely to have higher IQs as adults.<\/p>\n