Shepherd, a certified public accountant, previously served as chief financial officer for the UCF Foundation before accepting the interim position as the university’s COO.

In her new role, Shepherd will oversee the offices of finance and budget, and other strategic projects within the Division of Administration and Finance. She will report to Senior Vice President of Administration and Finance Gerald Hector, helping oversee all financial matters, the new budget model, and business processes that will shape UCF’s transparent reporting of financial information.

“Misty is an experienced and seasoned finance and accounting professional,” Hector says. “Having started her career in public accounting, she brings to this role not only those skills, but her relationships both on and off campus afford her the opportunity to meld her understanding of a plethora of UCF’s policies, practices and procedures into a strategy that can have immediate impact as we continue with our change management activities.”

Shepherd says she’s excited to return to the financial side of the university’s operations.

“This is an amazing group of talented professionals who provide critical infrastructure and service dedicated to the success of this institution and its mission, and I am truly honored by the opportunity to lend my support and leadership at such a pivotal time,” she says.

Senior photonic science and engineering major Rafaela Frota beat out six other finalist companies with her concept for Wawwe (We Are What We Eat.) The mobile app uses data and algorithms to help people decide whether they should eat something based on their personal dietary needs.

The competition rewards students who develop solutions intended to impact society’s biggest problems.

In under seven minutes, finalists had to present the problem they intended to solve, the solution they planned to offer, and a sustainable and scalable business model that could deliver the solution. Then they had up to three minutes to answer questions from a panel of three judges, who selected winners based on criterion such as concept, social impact, context, performance measures and presentation.

“The inspiration for Wawwe came from my desire to help give confidence and support to people diagnosed with a diet restrictive illness and were feeling lost and overwhelmed,” says Frota, who came up with the idea at 14 after watching food documentaries such as Food Inc. “My dream is to work with hospitals across the nation to bring Wawwe to as many patients as possible and increase their health through easy access, easy to understand personalized nutrition.”

Frota was awarded a $2,500 scholarship from State Farm Insurance, which sponsors the contest. Second-place finishers took home $1,250 and third-placed earned $500 in scholarship funding.

About the Competition

UCF’s Social Venture Competition differs from other business contests because at the core of each business is a greater purpose to serve individuals or a community. Cameron Ford, director of UCF’s Center for Entrepreneurial Leadership and Blackstone LaunchPad, created the competition in 2015 to provide a platform for students to learn how to utilize entrepreneurship to address complex, social problems.

“One of the challenges with social ventures or enterprises is evaluating their success,” Ford says. “It’s a little bit different from a standard corporate [measurement,] like sales, revenue, number of customers and stuff like that. Here you’re looking at things a little more broadly, like impact, which can be pretty difficult to measure.”

“UCF has really paved the way for us to have access to so many more opportunities … and we’re incredibly grateful for that.” –��David Thomas Moran ’14MFA

Last year, texts and technology doctoral student��David Thomas Moran ’14MFA��and��art major��Nathan Selikoff ’04,��a Burnett Honors Scholar,��were able to overcome this challenge. They won the competition with their transportation tech startup Omnimodal. The platform merges real-time public transportation information with already existing navigation apps so users can use their phones to get around easier. Their win at UCF led them to even greater success in the local community as they went on to win Central Florida’s Rally Social Enterprise Accelerator.

“The [Social Venture Competition] reminded Nathan and I that it’s so important to break out of our innovation silos and actively engage with all the incredible opportunity spaces across the Central Florida startup community here at UCF and beyond,” says Moran.��“UCF has really paved the way for us to have access to so many more opportunities since we won last year and we’re incredibly grateful for that.”

This Year’s Winners

About thirty minutes before this year’s competition, two finalists realized they had similar ideas for their long-distance ride sharing app – down to the same statistics used in their presentation.�� Rather than compete against each other, senior information technology major Eliecer Vera and junior computer science major Breezy Baldwin recognized an opportunity to be more successful through partnership

“It was really bizarre how identical they were. We both realized that neither of us would be likely to win the competition if we had the exact same pitch, but that it applied to our companies as well. We both can’t go head-to-head in the exact same market,” says Baldwin.

“We both realized that neither of us would be likely to win the competition if we had the exact same pitch.” –��Breezy Baldwin, UCF student

Within minutes Baldwin, who has been working on her idea for 18 months and Vera, who developed his four months ago, managed to successful merge their presentations and companies under the name Hchhkr (pronounced “hitchhiker”.) So much so that they earned second place. They plan to continue working together.

Third place was awarded to Connected Wise, a smart onboard device that aims to improve safety in rural areas by allowing drivers to communicate with one another about road conditions. The company’s founders, Enes Karaaslan and Burak Sen, developed the idea from the areas of focus in their civil engineering doctoral studies.

The Food Exchange, developed by junior finance major Aurora Pavlish-Carpenter and first-year environmental engineering major Talia Gratz, earned an honorable mention and received $250. The app focuses on reducing food waste by allowing users to trade their unwanted food with other users nearby.

Other Finalists

Three more companies qualified to present at the competition:

Students who are interested in pursuing any venture, social or otherwise, are encouraged to visit the Blackstone LaunchPad on the first floor of the Student Union to get one-on-one coaching from someone with experience or expertise.

Had she accepted the offer, Wiley’s salary would have been almost unheard of for recent graduates in the marketing field. Instead, she chose the title of CEO for her own company — .

As a result, the startup, which matches companies with social media influencers, has proven itself to be a leading innovative platform among Orlando’s emerging tech startups in just two years. Wiley credits the region’s growing entrepreneurial community and coworking spaces for much of her success and is looking forward to the possibilities in Orlando’s upcoming innovation district.

Finding a Niche

As an advertising and public relations major, Wiley was paid small amounts to advertise products for companies such as Hershey’s chocolates on her personal blog — a now-common practice in the marketing world known as influencer marketing. The experience landed her an internship at an advertising agency where she later accepted a full-time position upon graduation.

“They thought of me as this social media savvy graduate, so they allowed me to build influencer marketing relationships with brands,” Wiley says.

“Bloggers need a lot of content and products to post about, but they get expensive,” says��Kristen Wiley ’14.

She was soon tasked with leading the endeavor for the agency when she noticed there was something missing from the relationship between brands and bloggers.

“Bloggers need a lot of content and products to post about, but they get expensive,” says Wiley, who was a Honors Scholar. “And sometimes brands don’t send you products that match your interests.”

Wiley’s idea to use a curated subscription box for influencers in exchange for blog postings seemed like it could fill the gap. It was a fresh idea, but she wasn’t sure if it would work. Wiley bought joinstatus.com and continued working full time at the agency.

About a year later, Wiley was attending networking events around town when she was inspired by entrepreneur Suneera Madhani, CEO of the successful Orlando-based payment-processing company Fattmerchant.

“She was one of the first people who made me feel like I could do it,” says Wiley. “She had this confidence and strength in her business presentation, and something about that moment was a big turning point for me.”

Wiley then made a promise to herself: If she applied to a local business incubator program called StarterStudio and was accepted, she would pursue the venture full time.

Soon after, Statusphere was born in downtown Orlando.

StarterStudio Program Director Dayle Moore mentored Wiley in a variety of areas such as business model development, market strategy, fundraising and getting down her pitch.

“I’ve helped hundreds of startups, but it’s not every day you meet a founder like Kristen,” says Moore. “She brings a strong market understanding and passion to the table, while having an innovative idea and strategy to back it.”

Within the first year, Wiley had clients including Freeman Beauty, Safeway and Barnie’s Coffee and Tea Co. She also brought another Knight on to the team, Theresa Joseph ’17, as director of operations. Joseph’s previous experience included a finance internship at NASA. Much like Wiley, Joseph, a , realized that she wanted to pursue creativity and flexibility in her work. The alumni say the best part about running a startup is the ability to bounce ideas off each other and implement new concepts quickly.

“I think Kristen and I both have the same policy on things,” says Joseph. “Just say yes to new ideas and new opportunities, and then we’ll figure the rest out.”

Diminishing��Doubt

For Wiley and Joseph, the path to funding hasn’t been easy. Without investors, startups can’t scale the company up to a size effective enough to carry out its vision.

“Just say yes to new ideas and new opportunities, and then we’ll figure the rest out,” says��Theresa Joseph ’17.

On trips to Silicon Valley to pitch potential investors, Wiley had to fight her way through the criticisms of Statusphere. Investors liked the concept but said her location wouldn’t work. Jason Calacanis, a former New York City tech kingpin and well-known angel investor who was one of the first to fund Uber, was one of those critics.

He recommended Wiley take her company to cities such as Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco, suggesting they would be more beneficial to networking and company growth.

Wiley’s quick response? Orlando fits the job, and her dollars stretch further here. Orlando International Airport is one of the most affordable international airports in the country. There is a large talent pool of college graduates specializing in STEM. And the cost of living in Central Florida is significantly lower in comparison to San Francisco.

A strong case was made for keeping the company in Orlando to grow. Calacanis found the argument convincing enough to grant Statusphere a $100,000 investment and acceptance into the LAUNCH program, based in San Francisco.

With these new funds, Wiley and Joseph have been working on the logistics of the company and growing the team. They now have a staff of five, plus three interns —all are UCF graduates and students.

A Bright Future

The momentum for Statusphere is high and the startup movement in Orlando is not likely to slow down anytime soon. As digital technology permeates more of the world’s economy and social media remains a channel for brand innovation, opportunities for startups continue to grow.

UCF Downtown will place students in closer proximity to accelerator programs such as StarterStudio, and give them more opportunities to collaborate with high-tech and creative companies in downtown.

“UCF Downtown will be thought of as a pipeline into the entrepreneurial community that’s already rooted downtown,” Joseph says.

“UCF Downtown will be thought of as a pipeline into the entrepreneurial community that’s already rooted downtown,” says Joseph. “Between the space coast and the university, Orlando is primed for something really cool.”

For the two alumni, growing their company from Orlando couldn’t be a better decision.

“The bigger the tech culture grows, the bigger it will feel for everybody in it,” says Wiley.

“Without this welcoming community here, it’s hard to envision what we would be attached to. There are benefits financially, but the benefits of having the support of the Orlando community are bigger than we could have possibly imagined.”

More recently, his uncle David Phillips served in the U.S. Navy during World War II; his aunt Marion Phillips Scherer served as U.S. Navy nurse stationed at Walter Reed Hospital and in Panama, also during World War II; another uncle, Charles Phillips, served in the U.S. Air Force; and his father, Steve Phillips Jr., served as an officer in the U.S. Army Infantry for 30 years, fighting in World War II and the Vietnam War.

“The tradition lives on with the newest addition, my nephew Steve Phillips IV, who currently serves in the U.S. Naval Reserve (and is an Orange County Deputy Sheriff),” he says. “My family has established a proud history of service and love of liberty, which is now simply a part of our DNA.”

Phillips began his military journey after graduating from Oviedo High School. He was in the field artillery and spent a year in Oklahoma and two years in Augsburg, Germany. After receiving an honorable discharge two weeks after returning home, he started college at Valencia, with a concentration in business administration.

When he transferred to UCF, he joined the Army ROTC program — eventually becoming its corps commander — and was commissioned into the U.S. Army as a field artillery officer. During his career, he was stationed in Oklahoma, Germany, Colorado, Kentucky, Georgia and Saudi Arabia.

Through his experiences, he says he learned he can endure hostile weather and conditions and still come out just fine on the other end.

Retired from the Army, Phillips works as director of finance for the System of the Future at The Coca-Cola Company — an organization that has a long-standing relationship with the Armed Forces, dating back to World War II.

He credits his UCF business degree as the reason he’s worked in corporate finance at Coca-Cola for the past 16 years, as well as the reason that allowed him to be selected as a U.S. Army comptroller.

Now, he’s sharing his military and business experiences in his first book, “Boots to Loafers: Finding Your True North.”

“I’ve had [the book] in my mind for more than a decade,” he explains. “[It] details how our veterans, who have fought the good fight, can now find a new ‘true north’ to help guide them through the journey toward their second life, or new normal, outside the gate.”

Phillips had the opportunity to speak with fellow veterans about his book and experiences during the UCF Book Festival in April.

“I’m an avid veterans’ advocate, and helping those who will follow in my tracks is what I love to do,” he says. “I didn’t have anyone doing that for me when I retired, and I wish I did.”

REPORTING FOR Q&A DUTY

Q. What’s your least favorite word?

A. I have three off the top of my head. One is “dude.” I hate it. And, if anyone says it to me, I correct them quickly. I’d also say “no” is not one of my favorites either. It takes three “no”s to make me go away, and then there’s no guarantees. And last, “supposed to” or “should.” I hate it when people say this, because they are assuming something.

Q. If you could learn to do anything, what would it be?

A. Play the guitar like Stevie Ray Vaughn!

Q. What/who makes you laugh out loud?

A. Another 1982 UCF graduate and my best friend, Jim Lilly. We met on the practice football field at Oviedo High School trying to get the starting position on the team. We’ve been best friends for more than four decades, and he lives right down the road from me here in Georgia!

Q. What’s your favorite movie?

A. I have three: “Dirty Dozen,” “Jeremiah Johnson” and “The Great Escape.”

Q. What’s the best concert you ever attended?

A. Eagles, 1977, Munich Olympia Halle. An incredible concert.

Q. What’s your favorite place to visit?

A. Three places come to mind: British Virgin Islands, St. George Island, and the great state of Idaho.

Q. What’s something you learned in the past week?

A. Patience. Go on vacation with six children and you learn to exercise a tremendous amount of patience and understanding. What we take for granted, they are just learning. Coach, teach, and mentor — just like I learned in the U.S. Army — holds true with kids.

Q. What’s the best piece of advice you’ve ever received?

A. From my father: “Always take the harder right!”

Q. What or who inspires you?

A. I was inspired by my father. The things he did in his lifetime were incredible. He was one of the Greatest Generation… He was raised on a farm in rural South Carolina and went to Clemson College (was not a university back then) on a Sears & Roebuck scholarship, was in World War II and Vietnam, and retired from the U.S. Army as a Colonel. After his military career, he sold brick across the state of Florida, and much of UCF is his brick.

Q. What do you do for fun?

A. My wife and I love the British Virgin Islands. I also head west with my brother and close friends, and we either whitewater raft or canoe in remote locations through the western U.S. I’m an avid outdoorsman and love being in very remote and primitive locations.