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 WASHINGTON, D.C. — A member of St. Mark Parish in Huntersville is one of two students to win a $5,000 prize at The Catholic University of America’s Busch School of Business inaugural AI vibe-coding competition, “How Crazy Can You Get?”

Carter Virsik, a junior from Huntersville, developed “Pulse,” a gym membership management platform that tracks member activity, attendance and membership status. Daniel Vincent, a senior from Pflugerville, Texas, created “Cosmas,” an AI tool that helps medical device manufacturers detect defects and prevent product recalls.

Vibe coding uses natural language prompts to enable AI to generate code instead of requiring programmers to write it manually. 

Students were challenged to identify a real-world problem, build and deploy a working application with AI capabilities, and maintain a transparent development history on GitHub. Projects were judged on functionality, AI integration, code quality, user experience and business impact.

Virsik was inspired to create his platform after he noticed that gym employees were too bogged down with busy work to assist clients. 

“I decided to build an AI application that could make those employees more efficient at their jobs, which would in turn allow them to spend more time face-to-face with customers, which therefore would improve satisfaction and reduce member churn,” he said.

He encountered some technical challenges during the process that ultimately enhanced the product.

“I was able to find workarounds and ended up finding bigger and better features to add to my application that I never would have thought of if the difficulties never presented themselves,” he said.

Virsik noted that faith plays a key role in his life and he believes that, when used properly, AI can be a tool for good.

“Artificial Intelligence is inherently – by design – ‘artificial,’” he said. “However, my relationship with Jesus is genuine and very much real.”

“I am able to use AI to build many things – applications which I hope can be used as a force for good to help as many people as possible. If I can create more genuine, human-to-human interactions through the use of AI, I believe I am using it the right way. My faith has allowed me to look at AI as a way to use my skills to benefit others, and I am just at the tip of the iceberg.”

Participants learned the technique in 30 days with guidance from judges including professors, executives and alumni.

The competition was sponsored by David and Courtney Eisen of LuxRally Travel. David Eisen, a 2013 Catholic University alumnus, praised the students for delivering functioning products rather than simply proposing ideas.

— Catholic News Herald