common good

Counting Sleep: What happens when you mix a financial entrepreneur and an insomniac?

“Jason, stop. Go to sleep!”

It was 4 a.m. Once again, Jason Jin ’20 was clacking away on his keyboard, disturbing his roommate’s sleep. “Jason had a lot of sleep issues,” says Josh Collin ’20. “And I got a front-row seat.”

Jason Jin ’20

Josh Collin seated with his hands folded and wearing a suit.

Josh Collin ’20

Like many Swarthmoreans, Jin was a self-described overachiever. Stress turned into insomnia. Jin struggled with sleep each night, only to fly awake at 6 a.m. to find Collin doing pushups.

“He was a lark with an elaborate morning routine,” Jin says ruefully.

Yet the Swarthmore roommates proved a good match. Jin grew fascinated with wearable health-tracking devices that can analyze sleep data, becoming principal investigator on a sleep study in Assistant Professor Maggie Delano’s engineering lab. Meanwhile, Collin founded SWIFT — Savings, Wealth, Investment, Finance, and Trade — a campus organization promoting financial literacy. After seeing Jin’s insomnia first-hand, Collin thought, “Someone has to solve this problem.”

Collin’s entrepreneurial instincts and Jin’s fascination with sleep devices combined. They launched Bioloop, a sleep-coaching company, from their dorm room, receiving mentoring and early funding from Swarthmore’s Center for Innovation and Leadership. Bioloop interprets data from devices like the Apple Watch, Fitbit, and Oura Ring.

Those devices are cool, says Collin, but too much data can be overwhelming. The pair’s idea was to add a human element to all the data — a sort of personal sleep-trainer — to help people stop bad habits (eating before bed, too much blue light from screens) and develop and maintain good ones (meditation, healthy wind-down routines).

“Sleep is something we brush aside,” says Collin. “But we’re hurting our own longevity. Sleep is this missing pillar of health.”

As for the former roommates? They’re currently housemates in San Francisco, sharing a house with 12 other founders and seven newly hatched companies. And they’re both sleeping a healthy 7–8 hours a night.
— HEATHER RIGNEY SHUMAKER ’91

Artist’s rendering of the exterior of the Dining and Community Commons building

The College community has been challenged to raise $1.5 million for the Dining and Community Commons.

Energy Movement

Following the announcement of the College’s ambitious energy plan this spring, Rosamund Stone Zander ’64 made a $5 million gift to help fund the geo-exchange plant that will be housed in the basement of the forthcoming Dining and Community Commons. In addition to the gift, Zander will also support a challenge: If the College community raises $1.5 million for the geo-exchange plant by June 30, 2022, she will match the sum to fully fund the $8 million project. “What we have done to our environment since the Industrial Revolution stands out as the most critical issue of our time,” says Zander, a family therapist and executive coach who also serves on the board of Climate Reality, a nonprofit group headed by former Vice President Al Gore. “I am thrilled to support this amazing project, having experienced that Swarthmore’s commitment to reducing carbon in the air, and sustainability overall, runs very deep indeed.” Learn more: bit.ly/GeoExchangeDCC

We Are Humans

HAYDIL HENRIQUEZ ’14, an arts educator and cultural worker from the Bronx, has been named the first-ever Bronx Poet Laureate. During her two-year term, Henriquez will promote the inclusion of and passion for poetry across the NYC borough, looking to inspire a new generation of writers and poets, and to educate Bronx residents about the history of poetry. “It’s something so basic, but we often forget we’re humans,” Henriquez told the Bulletin in 2017. “In order for us to fill voids within us, we need to speak, we need to feel community, we need to share our stories.” Henriquez is the NYC Scholastic Art & Writing Awards manager at the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers.

Back to Full Issue

Table of Contents