The five-person team from George Fox University that makes up SitAct knows you might be slumping in front of your laptop while reading this blog post.
That’s why their invention, a pad that you sit on while working that will measure and analyze your posture, sending messages on screen with suggestions for improvement. The target market? The millions of potential customers who sit in front of a screen for far too many hours.
We caught up with SitAct before they hit the road to Klamath Falls to find out more. Team member Dwain Baumgartner stepped up as spokesman.
1. What was the inspiration for the SitAct invention?
Dwain Baumgartner: We are all engineers and understand the pain of sitting for hours on end.
2. Speaking of inspiration, who is your inventor hero and why?
DB: We don’t really have one.
3. What were the biggest lessons learned during the development of the SitAct prototype? What are the biggest changes you made to your invention and/or the pitch?
DB: I would recall the biggest hurdle being writing code to interpret a person's posture — more specifically, to determine if they had good posture or not. Biggest changes: shrinking the pad to target the more important portion of a person's seated area, and writing code to interpret that data.
4. What advice would you give to students thinking about joining next year's InventOR competition?
DB: In the last few months I have learned more about how to work with a team to get something done than I have on any school project. Therefore, I would tell students considering InventOR regardless of what you might think it’s really hard to buy this experience at a university. Once you’re in it, keep fighting through the long days and take advantage of everything you can along the way.
5. What will you bring with you to K Falls? What can we expect to see from SitAct?
DB: We will be demoing our latest prototype and more, all while trying to educate and promote healthy living.