Sixty-three students enrolled in the Tech Accelerator Program, or TAP, in the 2024-25 school year. 

Located in Stamford, Connecticut, TAP is run by the nonprofit DAE and Fortune 500 company Synchrony Bank. It teaches high school students skills ranging from web development to cybersecurity. Students from Stamford and Norwalk attend twice a week, working on unique projects with guidance from educators and courses tailored to their needs. 

All of the students received free access to program transportation, meals, computers and paid software thanks to DAE and Synchrony Bank. 

In an interview with the News, DAE Founder/CEO A.M. Bhatt spoke about the unusual partnership. “Corporate financial services…we [non-profits] aren’t supposed to like them. And they’re supposed to think that we’re out of touch do-gooders. That’s the cliche out in the world. One thing I’d love to find ways to get out there is how beautifully that relationship works. It’s a good example of how corporate and non-profits like ours can collaborate for social impact without either side compromising who they are.”

TAP launched in 2021 through Synchrony’s efforts to give back to the community and DAE’s mission to help bring educational opportunities to underrepresented youth. The program is hosted at Synchrony Bank’s Stamford Offices, where DAE instructors implement curriculum they design and mentor students. 

The curriculum for the program pushes students to explore technology frontiers while adapting to students interests. Bhatt stresses that as important as curriculum is, it’s important to make curriculum that is adaptive to student needs rather than making students keep up with curriculum.  

Synchrony Bank doesn’t just facilitate the program by offering its location. It also brings in employees to provide students with insights into more subject-matter that is corporate/subject oriented. Such sessions take place on ‘elective days’, which is an optional day held for students who have further questions or would like to take such courses. 

The program has had a great impact on participants over the past four years. 

Nundhini Mascarenhas is a rising senior who joined the program this year. She quickly felt at home, even joking that the game console “was simply the cherry on top.” Already self-taught in coding, she expanded her skills by building a personal blog that combined her love of technology and writing. She appreciated feedback tailored to her project and enjoyed mini presentations with peers. “It was pretty awesome to see what everyone was working on, whether that was an online store, an academic planner, or a cyberpunk video game.”

Camila Lopez, also a  rising senior, entered TAP without prior experience. By June, she created a successful e-commerce website to sell her crochet projects. Camila valued various aspects of the program including the meals, transportation and time to collaborate with her friends.

Manvitha Peela, a rising sophomore, created a project to help users locate local adoption shelters and find out which breeds are right for them. Manvitha’s favorite course about HTML helped improve the structure of her site, making it comprehensive for users. She also appreciated the transportation service. 

“If my parents were ever busy, I always had an option,” she wrote. For Manvitha, the year-end showcase was “really fun and I had a good time showing off my project. I also had very helpful friends and teachers throughout this year, which made it amazing.”

Entering its fifth year, TAP is expanding. Bhatt added that from the curriculum side, DAE plans to add a quantum computing program — one of only three open to high school students nationwide. Synchrony also plans to add its own program called CODE. Offered on elective days, high school students will have a chance to be mentored by Synchrony employees and gain more direct experiences with the corporate world. The program will help develop skills including branding and networking. 

Bhatt explains his hopes for the program’s impact. “It’s about home, about belonging. That they leave here at home in themselves and clear that whatever else they have in life, they have this place to come back to.”

The Tech Accelerator Program is located on 777 Long Ridge Rd. in Stamford, Conn.

This article was written for the Yale Daily News’ 2025 Summer Journalism Program for high school students.