These students represent a mix of undergraduate and graduate students from across ASU’s Ira A. Fulton School of Engineering, and are enrolled in programs across computer science, robotics and AI.
“It’s like a think tank for Zoom, but from the students, while they’re also building and learning about Zoom developer tools in the process,” said Amanda Federico, program coordinator for ASU Next Lab.
The Zoom Fellowship at ASU is an initiative made possible through the partnership between Zoom and Next Lab at Enterprise Technology. It is led by Dan Munnerley, Next Lab executive director, Bonnie Wilde, executive director for Enterprise Technology Affairs, and Johann Zimmern, global education marketing lead at Zoom.
Students help to drive forward innovation at Zoom
Liam Wirth and Neha Kashyap were among the first cohort of Zoom Fellows last year. They will continue working to lead in the development of Zoom products, while also providing mentorship to the new fellows.
“Zoom is a very forward-thinking company,” Wirth said. “I think it’s really cool that they want to work with universities and see how they can expand their platform to better serve students as well as professional customers.”
According to Kashyap, getting direct feedback from students can help the platform in making positive strides toward their goals.
“It’s a very different perspective a company can take by entrusting students to build something using their product, and give us that freedom,” Kashyap said. “I feel like there’s still kind of a separation between online learning and in-person learning, and I think Zoom is trying to bridge that gap through these innovative and exploratory ideas.”
Students mentoring students
On top of learning the ins and outs of the Zoom platform, Zoom Fellows act as mentors for several ASU Spark Challenges, assisting participants in bringing their inventive and cutting-edge tech solutions to life.
“What I would hope from this group of Zoom Fellows is that we have some prototypes … like webhooking games into the Zoom client,” Federico said. “Prototypes regarding things that have not been done yet in Zoom, and also things specifically pertaining to student life and life at ASU.”
In September, Enterprise Technology and Zoom hosted a creative hackathon where students prototyped ideas showcasing the power of Zoom software development kits. The winner of the ZoomQuest Spark Challenge is currently developing their project on the Zoom platform, and the winner of the Zoom AI Spark Challenge is working with Zoom Fellows to turn their pitched project into reality.
According to Dan Munnerley, students – both fellows and hackathon participants – frequently bring key insights and innovation to the table for platform development. These ideas included enhanced note taking, quiz generation, interview simulation, real-time American Sign Language, video linked lecture flash cards, Zoom rewind, and more.
Looking into 2026
Avidkaa Kapil is a new Zoom Fellow, working in ASU Next Lab and studying undergraduate computer science. Kapil’s focus is leveraging Zoom’s dedication to accessibility to bring new ideas to digital learning. For example, enhancing language assistance to the Zoom platform for international students.
“I would like to make the lives of students easier,” Kapil said. “Over the years, Zoom has been adding features and has been upgrading what it offers. For example, now they have that AI companion that gets you the notes, and there's recording, and a lot more.”
The Zoom Fellowship is meant to evolve as fellows research, build and produce innovations that will redefine how students connect and learn in the digital age.
“Being a fellow at Zoom, we can leverage this opportunity to basically make it a better platform for all the students out there,” Kapil said. “As a fellow here, you get to contribute your research and your ideas.”