Why I Built ThePodio: An AI-Powered Speech Coach for Every Student
# Why I Built The Podio: An AI-Powered Speech Coach for Every Student **By Manya Raisinghani**
I'm an 11th grader at Basis Independent McLean, and I'm a competitive speech student. Last year, I built something that changed how I practice — and I hope it can do the same for thousands of students like me.
This is the story of The Podio.
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## The Problem I Lived Every Day
Over 90,000 high school students compete in speech nationally. I'm one of them.
At a recent WACFL regional competition, I watched Our Lady of Good Counsel win nearly half of all the awards. They have dedicated coaching staff, structured programs, and years of institutional knowledge. My school? We're a STEM school. Our drama teacher manages the drama class and coaches speech on the side. We don't have a dedicated forensics program.
Students like me practice blind. We rehearse our speeches alone, hoping we're getting better — but never really knowing until we step in front of actual judges at competition. By then, it's too late to fix anything.
I kept asking myself: **What if every student could have an AI judge available 24/7?**
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## The Vision: Level the Playing Field
Not every school has forensics programs. Private coaches are expensive — often $50-100 per hour. But almost every student has a smartphone.
The Podio puts an AI-powered judge in your pocket. Record your speech, and within minutes you receive a detailed ballot scoring you across seven categories — just like a real competition judge would. The AI evaluates your content, analyzes your gestures, catches filler words like "um" and "uh," and assesses your overall delivery.
It's expert-level feedback, available on demand, whenever you want to practice.
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## What I Built
The Podio is a complete practice platform for competitive speech students:
**Dashboard**: Track your practice streak, see your average scores, and follow your journey from Beginner to Advanced.
**Event Selection**: The app supports all major speech categories — Extemporaneous, Impromptu, Original Oratory, and Declamation. Each event has its own rules and scoring criteria, and the AI knows all of them.
**Practice Sessions**: Record your speech (video or audio), upload it, and let the AI work its magic. You'll receive a detailed ballot with scores and feedback across seven judging categories.
**The Explore**: Watch championship reels from national finals to learn from the very best performers.
**History**: Track every practice session so you can spot patterns, measure improvement, and prepare strategically for competitions.
**Tournaments**: See upcoming competitions pulled directly from Tabroom, so you always know what's next.
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## How I Built It: 80,000 Lines of Code in 25 Days
Here's something that still surprises me: I built The Podio — all 80,000 lines of code — in just 25 days. As a one-person team.
How? By embracing AI at every layer of development:
- **Cursor IDE** for AI-assisted coding
- **Gemini Pro** for strategy, product requirements, and architecture decisions
- **Replit** for rapid prototyping and visual design
The entire platform runs on Google Cloud with Firebase. React Native and Expo let me write one codebase that runs on iOS, Android, and the web. Firebase Cloud Functions power 30+ serverless backend functions. Multiple Gemini AI models handle different aspects of speech analysis — content evaluation, gesture analysis, filler word detection, and more.
This AI-first approach means extremely low operating costs, unprecedented development speed, and the ability to pivot quickly based on user feedback.
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## The Bigger Opportunity
We're starting with 150,000 high school speech competitors — that's my community, my entry point.
But the vision is bigger:
- **Coaches**: Teachers using AI to evaluate entire classrooms, not just individual students
- **Schools**: Middle schools integrating speech practice into curriculum for all students, not just competitive speakers
- **Professionals**: Anyone who gives presentations and wants to improve
That's a total addressable market of over 10 million people who speak publicly.
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## The Mission: Give Back
Here's what matters most to me: **25% of all net proceeds from The Podio will be donated to fund education for underprivileged students.**
This isn't just about building a business. It's about giving back. When The Podio succeeds, students who can't afford coaching get access too.
The mission is simple: democratize access to quality feedback for anyone who speaks — and uplift those who need it most.
**When The Podio wins, everyone wins.**
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## Why I Built This
So why did I really build The Podio?
It's personal.
I've taken speech coaching since middle school. When I started competing last year, I saw the inequality firsthand. Schools with dedicated programs swept the awards. My STEM school doesn't have that. So I built the tool I wished existed.
Along the way, I learned real skills:
- Architecting scalable systems
- Orchestrating multiple AI models
- Designing user experiences
- Shipping a real product to real users
But this isn't just about me. With 25% of proceeds going back to underprivileged students, when The Podio succeeds, everyone succeeds.
That's why I built this.
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## Try It Today
**The Podio is live at [thepodio.com](https://thepodio.com)**
- Web App: Live now
- iOS: Available on TestFlight
- Android: Coming soon
Everyone gets 100 free credits when they sign up, plus 30 credits every month. That's enough to start practicing and see the difference AI-powered feedback can make.
I started with a problem I lived every day. I built a solution in 25 days. And I committed to giving back 25% to help others like me.
**Practice smarter. Compete stronger.**
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*Manya Raisinghani is a junior at Basis Independent McLean and the creator of The Podio. She competes in speech events through WACFL and is passionate about using technology to democratize education.*
