Founder — Jineshwar Nariani
Building a better bridge between CS students and their first jobs.
Workmark
Co-Founder · workmark.org
Workmark helps CS students build skills and credible work experience. Students team up on collaborative GitHub projects, and take on micro-internships and contract work with startups, SMBs and nonprofits.
The Problem
We saw it constantly as students ourselves: the college-to-job pipeline in CS has become incredibly hard to navigate. You need experience to get an internship, but an internship to get experience. Meanwhile, employers sort enormous applicant pools using noisy signals — resumes, GPA, school name and self-reported skills.
The Product
The work students do on Workmark, together with their existing experience, becomes a Workmark portfolio. It holds richer, verified information about their skills, proficiencies, contributions and actual work. It is evidence of what someone has built, rather than a resume an employer has to read between the lines of.
Progress
Over the summer we built the platform and secured initial funding, and Workmark is about to be established as a C-Corp. We have already begun bringing on students from UMass and other Massachusetts universities.
The Vision
Work with employers so that verified Workmark portfolios become a stronger signal for internships and entry-level roles. The goal is to give talented students a real chance to show what they can do, especially those without the connections or traditional credentials that catch a recruiter’s eye.