Compass USA

Immigrants deserve to know more about the country they'll call home. Streamline your journey to the US with our app. ChatGPT powers personalized support on questions about healthcare, housing & more.

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Inspiration

Our team was inspired to create CompassUSA to could help immigrants navigate the complex process of entering the United States. We recognized that this process can be daunting, especially for those who may not have access to the necessary resources or support. We wanted to create a platform that could provide accurate information and guidance to anyone seeking to immigrate to the US. With the goal of empowering individuals to make informed decisions and build a brighter future for themselves and their families, we set out to create an app that could streamline the immigration process and offer personalized support every step of the way.

What it does

Our app is designed to provide comprehensive, on-demand support to immigrants as they navigate the process of entering the United States. With the power of OpenAI's gpt-3.5-turbo, our platform offers personalized assistance on a range of topics including healthcare, housing, jobs, and more. CompassUSA provides accurate and up-to-date information to help guide you through the immigration process or answer any questions about how to find resources afterward. 47-54% of immigrants struggle to migrate to the country because they are simply overwhelmed with what to do - but by offering not only a response to their questions but links for sources and additional information, CompassUSA offers a starting point, at the very least, and a one-stop shop for resources and information at the very most.

How we built it

Our team used a variety of technologies to build our app, including Next 13, Tailwind, React, Clerk, and Radix-UI. Our team utilized Next 13, Tailwind, React, and Radix-UI to build an intuitive and user-friendly interface that allows users to easily access information and resources relevant to their unique situation. We embodied a minimalistic but clean web design methodology along with a light/dark theme using Tailwind CSS. In order to implement user accounts and GitHub/Google integration features, we used Clerk. We also utilized OpenAI to power our personalized support feature, which provides users with customized assistance on a range of topics.

To build the app, we first identified the key features and functionality that we wanted to include, such as a user-friendly interface, accurate information on visa requirements, and personalized recommendations for certain topics. We then worked collaboratively to design and build the app, testing and refining each feature to ensure that it met our high standards for usability and functionality. As such, our app has a high degree of accessibility. Selecting a topic is extremely simple and can be intuitively done by selecting a point on the compass, or searching it up by itself. There are additional customizability features like a light/dark mode and a search bar to navigate the app.

To implement the actual answering feature, we broke a user query into 2 parts. In the first part, the user choose which topic is relevant to their question and what exactly they need help on. This then is sent to gpt-3.5-turbo through the OpenAI API, along with predetermined parameters to give it the necessary context that it must specifically parse relevant immigration data from the last 2 years from sources like the US Customs and Border Protections, UN, and CDC. This information is all sourced from api.data.gov, part of the US Government's initiative for open government, and the United Nations.

The response is broken into 3 elements: An easily digestible word response, along with a list of sources that it scraped and parsed from the web to generate its answer, and links for further reading and research if the user would like. This allows the user to see how accurate the response is by viewing the sources and allows them to do their own research to see if the other links answer their questions as well.

Challenges we ran into

We were committed to building a typesafe and foolproof app that could provide accurate and reliable support to immigrants, while also being technically sound. One of the biggest challenges we faced was getting the types right and ensuring that our platform could handle all the different types of inputs that users might provide. Additionally, we had to work carefully to ensure that our OpenAI input was designed correctly and that we were selecting the right parameters to get the best results. Additionally, given the constantly evolving nature of immigration policies and regulations, one of the main challenges we faced while building the app was ensuring that the information we provided was accurate and up-to-date. We also had to grapple with the complexity of the immigration process itself, which can be difficult to navigate even for those with extensive experience in the field. Nonetheless, by providing time constraints and getting only the most recent versions of immigration legislation, we were able to overcome this issue, but not without a bit of a headache from messing with the API endpoints.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We are extremely proud of the accuracy and reliability of our app, as well as the depth and usefulness of the resources we provide. We worked tirelessly to create an app that could help answer questions about housing, healthcare, jobs, and more, and we are thrilled to see it potentially make a positive impact on the lives of immigrants. Additionally, we were able to learn a lot about the immigration process ourselves and feel that this knowledge has helped us to better understand the challenges faced by those seeking to enter the United States.

What we learned

Through the process of building our app, we learned a great deal about the immigration process, including the challenges and complexities that immigrants face when trying to enter the United States. We were able to gain a deeper appreciation for the importance of accurate and reliable information in this process and feel that this experience has helped us to better understand and support those seeking to immigrate.

What's next for Compass USA

Moving forward, we plan to expand the scope of our platform to incorporate immigration information from other countries and regions, such as the EU, which also receives a high volume of immigration. We believe that accurate and reliable resources are essential for facilitating the peaceful and fluid integration of new immigrant populations, and we are committed to continuing to develop our app to meet the needs of a global audience. We look forward to continuing to make a positive impact in the lives of immigrants, and to supporting them as they navigate the complex process of entering a new country. Watch out for Compass EU!

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