Social Impact Internships: Kevin Xie (’28)
Hi! My name is Kevin Xie, and I am a first-year student planning to double major in AI & Decision Making and Mathematics. This IAP, I worked as a Full-Stack Engineer Intern at Birth By Us (BBU), a startup co-founded by a former MIT student (go MIT!) that seeks to address disparities in Black maternal health. I helped develop the Birth By Us app, a community-centered platform that reimagines the pregnancy, birth, and postpartum experience for women of color. During my time at BBU, I implemented new features essential for ensuring that users receive the support they need while gaining deeper insights into their health symptoms and trends.
The central issue that BBU aims to tackle is maternal health. Currently, the maternal mortality rate (MMR) is more than three times the goal set by SDG 3.1. These challenges are particularly severe in communities of color, where systemic health inequities persist. Black women, in particular, face significant barriers that impact their access to quality maternal care.
To address this issue, BBU provides a pregnancy and postpartum app designed to offer comprehensive support for Black mothers who may otherwise lack access to vital resources. The app checks in with users daily through well-being-focused questions, creates a tight-knit community of mothers, provides expert-reviewed and personalized resources, and offers many other impactful features. By giving users the language to articulate their feelings, BBU empowers moms and their support teams with the tools they need to advocate for themselves—especially in situations where their voices might otherwise go unheard.
Interning at a startup pushed me outside my comfort zone. As one of only two interns on a small team, I held a wide range of responsibilities, from debugging Angular components to optimizing thousand-line long functions. At first, I hesitated to voice my ideas in meetings, fearing that my limited experience might prevent me from contributing meaningfully. However, I soon realized that my perspectives provided value to the team, and I learned the importance of speaking up, even when uncertain.
Working closely on this issue over the past month has also opened my eyes to how communities of color are disproportionately affected by healthcare disparities. This experience pushed me to think critically about the intersection of technology, policy, and healthcare, and how meaningful change requires collaboration across multiple disciplines. Specifically, I have realized that the crisis in Black maternal health is shaped by deeply rooted systemic racism, cultural dismissal, and the erasure of Black women’s voices in healthcare spaces. Working on the app’s features allowed me to contribute to addressing this issue by providing Black women with supportive tools to help navigate their pregnancy journey. However, I also recognize that technology alone cannot dismantle these barriers and that lasting change requires continued social efforts. BBU’s commitment to centering Black women’s voices in both the design and implementation of their app is a powerful example of how technology can be a force for equity and empowerment.
Looking forward, this experience has been beneficial to both my professional and personal aspirations. Professionally, I have discovered a passion for mission-driven startups and gained insight into what a potential career in software engineering entails. Personally, I have learned to approach problem-solving with humility and recognized the importance of collaboration and diverse perspectives in addressing complex challenges. Interning at BBU has been the most meaningful month of my MIT journey so far. It reaffirmed my belief that technology can be transformative. I am leaving IAP feeling immensely fulfilled, knowing that my work contributed to something truly meaningful. I would highly recommend this opportunity to every student!
Tags: Health, Health & Medicine, Social Impact Internships, Social Impact Internships 2025
