New mobile app helps students lend a hand on campus 

When students are in need of a little help on campus, they usually turn to their closest friends for a favor. But thanks to a new mobile app, they might be able to enlist strangers for a hand.

STRIVR is an iOS app where people on a college campus can ask for favors and advice from members of the app’s community.

For those unfamiliar, STRIVR functions somewhat like a cross between Yik Yak and Craigslist. Users who post a question can expect responses from a proximity-based pool of peers willing to lend a hand, whether they are looking to buy a textbook from another student or simply asking if a certain dining hall is crowded.

According to Freddy Suppes, a brand ambassador for STRIVR, the program was originally created by a baseball player at Bates College who had been sidelined with a leg injury. Often in need of assistance throughout the day, he felt like he began to annoy his friends by asking them for help repeatedly. So, instead, the player created STRIVR and opened his requests up to the community.

Suppes says to imagine yourself in Belk Library with a dying cell phone. Instead of reaching out to a limited pool of friends, a student who had downloaded STRIVR could have their inquiry land on the screens of hundreds of students across campus, some of whom might be in the library and have a charger to offer.

STRIVR is free to download and can be found on the iTunes App Store.