Two Endicott Gulls have earned scholarships to attend the Harvard Business School Founder Mindset Bootcamp, an intensive eight-week program designed to help aspiring entrepreneurs sharpen their ideas, strengthen their leadership skills, and develop the confidence needed to navigate the challenges of building a venture.
Therien Thiesing ’27, an entrepreneurship major, and Keveen Delgado ’25 M’26, who holds a B.S. in exercise science and M.S. in sport leadership, were selected to participate.
The bootcamp operates under Foundry, Harvard Business School’s AI-native digital workspace that supports high-potential founders to turn early-stage ideas and research breakthroughs into scalable ventures with real-world impact.
Participants will focus on problem clarity, market mapping, validation, and pitch development. Thiesing and Delgado will collaborate with fellow founders navigating similar obstacles, creating opportunities to exchange ideas, gain new perspectives, and build lasting connections within an emerging entrepreneurial community.
For Thiesing, the experience will provide an opportunity to further develop his business, Compatible AI, into a scalable and investment-ready venture.
“Compatible AI builds the connection layer between AI assistants and the booking and scheduling platforms that appointment-based businesses already run on. A merchant becomes discoverable and bookable inside AI without changing their tech stack,” said Thiesing. “Our goal is to provide every service business with a new revenue stream to reach customers on the AI apps they use every day.”
Delgado will be building up Sway, his startup focused on helping campus venues better understand and engage their communities. Through a simple check-in experience, Sway allows students to build a participation history while giving venues visibility into attendance, repeat visits, and event engagement.
“The platform was piloted at Gully’s this past spring on Endicott’s campus,” said Delgado. “Through the boot camp, I’ll be working on customer discovery, product development, and testing how Sway can scale to other colleges and student communities and beyond.”
The cohort will begin in August 2026.