Trio of Coyotes win Boston Hult Prize Regional Summit

BOSTON—Coyote cross country runners Brigit Blote and Ashlynn Atwood along with triathlete Payton Ryz won the Hult Prize Regional Summit in Boston earlier this month. Their team, Threads of Green, placed first ahead of some of the nation’s most prestigious institutions including Harvard, Princeton, MIT, Vanderbilt, Duke and others.

By winning the Boston Regional Summit, the trio is eligible to compete against 11 other international teams for a $1,000,000 seed funding award at a Global Accelerator later this summer. 

The Hult Prize is one of the world’s most acclaimed entrepreneurship programs operating on more than 1,500 university campuses in 121 countries. Hult Prize works to build startup companies that have a positive impact on the planet.

This year’s Hult Prize challenge was titled “Building Startups that Have a Positive Impact on Our Planet with Every Dollar Earned” and the USD students presented their business, Forget Me Not, to a highly decorated panel of Hult Prize judges.

This marked the second appearance at a Hult Prize Regional for both Blote and Atwood, who represented USD a year ago in San Francisco. They previously worked with Katie Brust and Amber Ellison, who now serve as the Hult Prize Campus Director and Assistant Campus Director, respectively.

“We were looking to expand the team this year and Payton Ryz came to mind immediately,” Blote said. “Payton has a passion for protecting the earth, motivating others to be their best selves and has an energy about her that is contagious.”

The next step for the Threads of Green team will be to attend the final accelerator round of the Hult Prize Competition at the end of the summer. The accelerator takes the winning team from each regional competition across the globe and brings them together to be coached and guided into starting up their venture. It will conclude with a competition where teams will be battling for the million-dollar prize.

“It is an incredible honor to be able to represent the University of South Dakota on this global stage,” said Blote. “We are incredibly excited for the journey ahead and cannot thank the University enough for its support in getting us here!”

About Forget Me Not

Forget Me Not is a mobile app which pulls data from multiple online thrift stores to allow shoppers to search for specific clothing items in one place. The goal is to make second-hand shopping easy, efficient and enjoyable.

The business addresses the destructive, linear model of fast fashion by transforming the industry into a circular economy. The app encourages thrifting – the most sustainable way to purchase clothing.

The company’s mission is to make thrifting more accessible to the consumer and increase profits for online thrift shops.