SCH Academy High School entrepreneurs
What is CAPSTONE?
All SCH sophomores engage in the Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership (CEL) Capstone—a unique, self-directed project-design experience. With the support of dedicated faculty mentors and access to specialized studios, students bring ideas inspired by their personal passions to life using the business, design, and technology skills learned in previous CEL classes.
Students may elect to continue their work in their junior and senior years through Venture Accelerator.
Since May 2020, SCH has been offering a virtual Capstone Showcase for people to go online and vote for their favorite Capstone Project. Scroll down to view winning projects!
read about our sophomore
STUDENT ENTREPRENEURS
Taco 'Bout It
Chuck '22
His Challenge: Giving kids the opportunity to initiate vulnerable conversations with their parents about mental health.
His Solution: Taco 'Bout It, a fun family card game that encourages conversation about mental health and wellness using real-life teenage situations and experiences.
One thing I've learned through the CEL Capstone class is how to have meaningful discussions with professional adults and the ways I can apply their advice to my ideas. With their expertise, I felt empowered and supported to create a well-rounded project.
PACE
Layla '25 and zarin '25
Their Challenge: To provide help for students struggling with time management and getting school work done.
Their Solution: An app has a calendar for organizing assignments and due dates, and a study timer that uses the Pomodoro method to help create effective studying while encouraging users to stay off their phones. Their hope is to create positive academic habits that students can use through high school and beyond.
Zarin crafted an elegant U/X design while Layla learned how to implement a variety of advanced coding techniques toward the creation of a time management app to help students learn how to balance academics, extracurricular activities, personal time and more.
Dr. Day | Pace was the App Studio & People's Choice Winner in 2023
Golf-a-Lot
Josh '25
His Challenge: To create unique mini-golf spaces across vacant lots in Philadelphia that hold no purpose.
His Solution: Josh's idea, Golf-a-Lot, converts Philadelphia infill lots into something more useful, fun, and innovative: a multi-level mini-golf course.
Josh dreamed up such a fun, innovative, and unique idea for his project, Golf-a-Lot. He merged his passion for golf and his desire to design together in this innovative venture of identifying vacant infill lots in Philadelphia, and building multi-level outdoor/indoor miniature golf centers with up to 18 holes on them. He learned SketchUp and became very proficient with the 3D Modeling Program and designed a digital prototype of Golf-a-Lot, fit out with a glass lobby and stairs and all 18 holes.
Mrs. Fajardo | Golf-a-Lot won the DaVinci Award for Creativity in 2023
PlasTEKK
CarolinE '21
Her Challenge: Eliminate the presence of single-use plastics in the ocean.
Her Solution: PlasTEKK, a creative workspace that inspires earth-friendly innovation by transforming used plastic bottles into 3d-printer filament. For every bottle collected, consumers receive PlanIT store credits that they can spend on digital design classes, spools of filament, and other recycled retail products.
The CEL program gave me much more than a curriculum in which I could explore an idea.CEL taught me lifelong lessons through a hands-on approach. It taught me patience, perseverance, responsibility, and much more about myself.
MidiGuitar
Tony '22
His Challenge: To simplify the control of guitar effects without the need for a large array of effects pedals.
His Solution: MidiGuitar is a custom-built guitar with an X/Y MIDI touchpad built into the face, which can provide a MIDI output to connect to any MIDI device. This can connect to software, or other hardware, and alter the guitar sound in any number of ways, such as applying low- and high-pass filters, or adding fuzz and distortion. The touchpad can also connect to any MIDI device, such as a virtual synthesizer to replicate the sound of other instruments that aren't a guitar.
CEL has given me an opportunity to combine my interests in music and engineering. Through designing the body, I was able to learn about computer-aided design and manufacturing, along with woodworking skills that I never would have learned otherwise.
Virtual capstone Showcase Projects
from over the years
ALL
A physical filtering water bottle and straw combination that purifies water through a multi-step process, removing harmful pathogens and bacteria.
- Nonprofits
- Products
Makes drone-deployed seed darts that can plant trees in deforested areas much more efficiently and effectively than traditional hand-based planting.
- Products
A mobile app experience that offers an expansive collection of warm-up maneuvers used by college and professional athletes to reduce injuries.
- Apps
A website to provide every teen with a professional network to find their first job.
- Apps
- Service
A fun family card game that destigmatizes the conversation surrounding mental health.
- Products
A hand-tied fishing fly company - with unique flies to imitate bugs, frogs, baitfish, rodents, and crustaceans.
- Products
A line of military dog tags and police badges with pictures and/or quotes of someone lost in the military or law enforcement.
- Nonprofits
- Products
An app that connects struggling high school students with student tutors.
- Apps
A subscription box non-profit featuring products from local businesses in the Philadelphia area.
- Nonprofits
- Products
A trashcan with embedded technology that helps users easily separate recyclables from waste.
- Products
A drone designed and developed with the purpose of exploring underwater through the use of sensors, cameras, and lights.
- Products
A film surrounding the life of a teenager in quarantine, struggling to balance school, mental health, and keeping up a social life.
- Media & Design
Charity art exhibitions and auctions to help with the post-Yushu Earthquake reconstruction in Tibet.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Services
A website that teaches senior citizens about the internet and how to use it safely.
- Apps
- Services
An affordable blanket to provide protection for people experiencing homelessness and campers.
- Media & Design
- Products
- Services
A system of providing a musical safe space for teens that are struggling with mental health.
- Nonprofits
An assisted listening device to help prevent hearing, sight, & sleeping disorders in the developmentally disabled.
- Nonprofits
- Products
A water dispensing system to reduce plastic water bottle waste.
- Products
- Services
A charter school that teaches new criteria based off of student surveys and does not discriminate.
- Media & Design
Emotional support dogs brought in during high pressure school days to decrease stress and anxiety.
- Nonprofits
- Services
A learning space for the SCH community to come together and hear from experts on topical subjects that evoke curiosity and communal learning.
- Services
A service that turns a normal car into a self-driving car.
- Products
- Services
A penpal style website that connects students from different countries to expand cultural interactions and improve foreign language fluency.
- Apps
A unique ankle brace that uses heat and cool to enhance healing.
- Products
- Services
An eco friendly surfboard made from sustainable materials.
- Products
An online subscription service that delivers disposable mouth guards to people suffering from Bruxism (teeth grinding).
- Products
- Services
Research project designed to help better the understanding of OCD & anxiety in the educational environment.
- Apps
- Services
A portable filtration system that uses a reverse osmosis system to take dirty water from any source and purify it.
- Nonprofits
- Services
Original animal keychains with all proceeds donated to the World Wildlife Fund. Shop here today.
- Products
A trolley-car turned mobile greenhouse to help alleviate food insecurity in Philadelphia.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Products
- Services
A website that gives users a score based on their personal environmental impact.
- Apps
- Media & Design
- Services
Upcycles old clothes into new clothes, whether that's splitting two pieces in half and stitching them together or doing patchwork.
- Media & Design
Winner: Invention Studio Award!
- Products
Winner: Infinity Prize for Resiliency!
- Media & Design
Winner: The Awake Teamwork Prize!
- Apps
Winner: Delphi Opportunity Seeking Prize!
- Mindset-Award
- Nonprofits
Winner: The Awake Teamwork Prize!
- Apps
- Services
Winner: Social Impact Award!
- Nonprofits
Winner: Delphi Opportunity Seeking Prize!
- Products
Winner: MacGyver Resourcefulness Prize!
- Products
Winner: DaVinci Creativity Prize!
- Media & Design
Winner: New Media Studio Award!
- Products
Winner: People's Choice Award & App Studio Award!
- Apps
Winner: The Sands Award!
- Services
Winner: DaVinci Creativity Prize!
- Products
- Services
Winner: Startup Award!
- Services
Winner: MacGyver Resourcefulness Prize!
- Apps
Apps
A mobile app experience that offers an expansive collection of warm-up maneuvers used by college and professional athletes to reduce injuries.
- Apps
A website to provide every teen with a professional network to find their first job.
- Apps
- Service
An app that connects struggling high school students with student tutors.
- Apps
A website that teaches senior citizens about the internet and how to use it safely.
- Apps
- Services
A penpal style website that connects students from different countries to expand cultural interactions and improve foreign language fluency.
- Apps
Research project designed to help better the understanding of OCD & anxiety in the educational environment.
- Apps
- Services
A website that gives users a score based on their personal environmental impact.
- Apps
- Media & Design
- Services
Winner: The Awake Teamwork Prize!
- Apps
Winner: The Awake Teamwork Prize!
- Apps
- Services
Winner: People's Choice Award & App Studio Award!
- Apps
Winner: MacGyver Resourcefulness Prize!
- Apps
Media & Design
A film surrounding the life of a teenager in quarantine, struggling to balance school, mental health, and keeping up a social life.
- Media & Design
Charity art exhibitions and auctions to help with the post-Yushu Earthquake reconstruction in Tibet.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Services
An affordable blanket to provide protection for people experiencing homelessness and campers.
- Media & Design
- Products
- Services
A charter school that teaches new criteria based off of student surveys and does not discriminate.
- Media & Design
A trolley-car turned mobile greenhouse to help alleviate food insecurity in Philadelphia.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Products
- Services
A website that gives users a score based on their personal environmental impact.
- Apps
- Media & Design
- Services
Upcycles old clothes into new clothes, whether that's splitting two pieces in half and stitching them together or doing patchwork.
- Media & Design
Winner: Infinity Prize for Resiliency!
- Media & Design
Winner: DaVinci Creativity Prize!
- Media & Design
Nonprofits
A physical filtering water bottle and straw combination that purifies water through a multi-step process, removing harmful pathogens and bacteria.
- Nonprofits
- Products
A line of military dog tags and police badges with pictures and/or quotes of someone lost in the military or law enforcement.
- Nonprofits
- Products
A subscription box non-profit featuring products from local businesses in the Philadelphia area.
- Nonprofits
- Products
Charity art exhibitions and auctions to help with the post-Yushu Earthquake reconstruction in Tibet.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Services
A system of providing a musical safe space for teens that are struggling with mental health.
- Nonprofits
An assisted listening device to help prevent hearing, sight, & sleeping disorders in the developmentally disabled.
- Nonprofits
- Products
Emotional support dogs brought in during high pressure school days to decrease stress and anxiety.
- Nonprofits
- Services
A portable filtration system that uses a reverse osmosis system to take dirty water from any source and purify it.
- Nonprofits
- Services
A trolley-car turned mobile greenhouse to help alleviate food insecurity in Philadelphia.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Products
- Services
Winner: Delphi Opportunity Seeking Prize!
- Mindset-Award
- Nonprofits
Winner: Social Impact Award!
- Nonprofits
Products
A physical filtering water bottle and straw combination that purifies water through a multi-step process, removing harmful pathogens and bacteria.
- Nonprofits
- Products
Makes drone-deployed seed darts that can plant trees in deforested areas much more efficiently and effectively than traditional hand-based planting.
- Products
A fun family card game that destigmatizes the conversation surrounding mental health.
- Products
A hand-tied fishing fly company - with unique flies to imitate bugs, frogs, baitfish, rodents, and crustaceans.
- Products
A line of military dog tags and police badges with pictures and/or quotes of someone lost in the military or law enforcement.
- Nonprofits
- Products
A subscription box non-profit featuring products from local businesses in the Philadelphia area.
- Nonprofits
- Products
A trashcan with embedded technology that helps users easily separate recyclables from waste.
- Products
A drone designed and developed with the purpose of exploring underwater through the use of sensors, cameras, and lights.
- Products
An affordable blanket to provide protection for people experiencing homelessness and campers.
- Media & Design
- Products
- Services
An assisted listening device to help prevent hearing, sight, & sleeping disorders in the developmentally disabled.
- Nonprofits
- Products
A water dispensing system to reduce plastic water bottle waste.
- Products
- Services
A service that turns a normal car into a self-driving car.
- Products
- Services
A unique ankle brace that uses heat and cool to enhance healing.
- Products
- Services
An eco friendly surfboard made from sustainable materials.
- Products
An online subscription service that delivers disposable mouth guards to people suffering from Bruxism (teeth grinding).
- Products
- Services
Original animal keychains with all proceeds donated to the World Wildlife Fund. Shop here today.
- Products
A trolley-car turned mobile greenhouse to help alleviate food insecurity in Philadelphia.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Products
- Services
Winner: Invention Studio Award!
- Products
Winner: Delphi Opportunity Seeking Prize!
- Products
Winner: MacGyver Resourcefulness Prize!
- Products
Winner: New Media Studio Award!
- Products
Winner: DaVinci Creativity Prize!
- Products
- Services
Services
Charity art exhibitions and auctions to help with the post-Yushu Earthquake reconstruction in Tibet.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Services
A website that teaches senior citizens about the internet and how to use it safely.
- Apps
- Services
An affordable blanket to provide protection for people experiencing homelessness and campers.
- Media & Design
- Products
- Services
A water dispensing system to reduce plastic water bottle waste.
- Products
- Services
Emotional support dogs brought in during high pressure school days to decrease stress and anxiety.
- Nonprofits
- Services
A learning space for the SCH community to come together and hear from experts on topical subjects that evoke curiosity and communal learning.
- Services
A service that turns a normal car into a self-driving car.
- Products
- Services
A unique ankle brace that uses heat and cool to enhance healing.
- Products
- Services
An online subscription service that delivers disposable mouth guards to people suffering from Bruxism (teeth grinding).
- Products
- Services
Research project designed to help better the understanding of OCD & anxiety in the educational environment.
- Apps
- Services
A portable filtration system that uses a reverse osmosis system to take dirty water from any source and purify it.
- Nonprofits
- Services
A trolley-car turned mobile greenhouse to help alleviate food insecurity in Philadelphia.
- Media & Design
- Nonprofits
- Products
- Services
A website that gives users a score based on their personal environmental impact.
- Apps
- Media & Design
- Services
Winner: The Awake Teamwork Prize!
- Apps
- Services
Winner: The Sands Award!
- Services
Winner: DaVinci Creativity Prize!
- Products
- Services
Winner: Startup Award!
- Services