H EADLINES
Student Hopes to Repair World With Data
L OCA L
JESSE BERNSTEIN | JE STAFF
IF YOU’RE NOT careful,
you’ll lose the battleground
states pretty quickly.

Georgia is more up for grabs
than you realize, but if you
spend too much time fi ghting
what feels like a lost cause in
Florida, you’ll probably let the
Peach State and North Carolina
slip away. Th irty-three days
to go until the election, and
you realize that you haven’t
done any fundraising in a few
days, either. Rallies take a lot of
energy out of you, and whether
they move the needle is an
open question.

Th ere’s just so much to
juggle; you have to take a whole
day to pander, and even specify
which ideological key you want
6 OCTOBER 15, 2020
to pander in.

It isn’t Zach Schapiro’s
intention to stress you out
with his presidential election
simulation game, Election
Accomplice, which is based on
a forecast model he designed.

In fact, the 16-year-old junior
at Springside Chestnut Hill
Academy hopes that his game,
available for free in the Apple
App Store, spurs people his age
to a greater interest in politics.

“Being able to help teach
people about politics in a way
I’m able to, with all of the
numbers, is something that
is pretty cool,” Schapiro said.

“And I’m hoping people are
able to learn a lot about that
so that they can become more
educated voters.”
Vincent Day, program
director of Computer Science
& Interactive Technologies
at SCH, has known Schapiro
since he was in elementary
school. Back then, Schapiro’s
warp speed advancement in
math, computer science and
whatever other subject he put
his mind to was already well
known throughout the school.

Day began working with him
in a one-on-one capacity,
and he’s ready to present his
conclusions. Schapiro, he said,
“was the fi rst genius that I have
ever worked with.”
“He’s one of the kindest, and
empathetic, and helpful young
men I’ve worked with,” Day
said. “In all of the classes that
I taught, he was well advanced,
so he could do things in a
week that would take a lot of
the other students an entire
semester to do. So Zach took it
upon himself to become a very
thoughtful student leader.”
Schapiro’s early aptitude in
computer science was noticed
by Day, as well as by Edward
Glassman, executive director
of the Sands Center for
Entrepreneurial Leadership at
SCH. Both men see their jobs at
SCH as “unlocking the passions
of our students,” according to
Glassman, and for this partic-
ular student, that’s meant
years of tutoring, making sure
Schapiro had all the resources
he needed. Day has even had to
learn right alongside Schapiro,
in some cases, given the
advanced nature of his pursuits.

Schapiro is a devotee
of FiveThirtyEight.com,
the website created by the
banner-carrier for data-based
political analysis in the United
States, Nate Silver. But his
interest in coding and data
actually precedes his interest in
politics; his fi rst major coding
project was called Mahjong
Accomplice. Schapiro learned
the game by watching his
bubbe play and, like any good
grandson, translated that
knowledge into an app that
teaches people how to play the
game, alongside data-based
JEWISH EXPONENT
Zach Schapiro, alongside the code that makes up Election Accomplice
Photo by Edward Glassman
suggestions on the correct
move to make in a given
situation. Another project, hoping to
beat the Las Vegas NFL spreads,
was “somewhat successful.”
“Not amazing,” he said, “but
better than 50/50.”
Th e furor of the 2016 election
drew Schapiro’s interest, and
the work he’s done since then
— on Election Accomplice,
but also on Fantasy Politics, a
project undertaken alongside
fellow SCH student Elizabeth
Shoup — refl ects that his
interest in data preceded that
of his interest in politics.

Assumptions that are baked
into Election Accomplice, as
well as into Fantasy Politics,
come from probabilities
divined from the data, rather
than gut-feeling punditry.

Th e project of Election
Accomplice, Schapiro said,
which involves an interac-
tive election modeling tool
alongside the game itself, is
his method of tikkun olam.

Th e rabbi at his synagogue,
Congregation Beth Or’s
Gregory Marx, talks quite a
bit about leaving the world
better than one found it, and
educating people in the way
he’s capable of doing, Schapiro
said, is his way of living that.

Th ough predictive analysis
may be a mostly sound method
of thinking about politics, it
doesn’t function in the same
way when you’re deciding what
you want to do with your life.

Schapiro is fortunate to have
the problem of many interests
— robotics, history, sports and
economics are also subjects of
frequent inquiry and practice
— and he isn’t yet sure what he
will pursue.

“Whatever fi eld I’m in, I’d
like to be using all the diff erent
things I’m passionate about in
my work, so that I can really
enjoy my career,” he said.

“Whatever it is.” ●
jbernstein@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



Name: Sanofi Genzyme
Width: 9.25 in
Depth: 11 in
Color: Black plus one
Comment: JE-ROP
Ad Number: 00091937
BONE PAIN
CAN BE
MORE SERIOUS
THAN YOU
THINK. Could you have Gaucher disease and not know it?
Did you know there are treatments?
Common symptoms of Gaucher disease include bone pain, nose bleeds, easy bruising
and fatigue. You may experience one or none of these symptoms, but could still have
Gaucher disease.

The condition can be effectively managed, however many are misdiagnosed or assume they
were tested.

Treatment options are available including oral therapies.

It’s just a simple blood test. Get tested.

For testing information call 1-833-GoGaucher
©2020 Genzyme Corporation. All rights reserved. MAT-US-2018550-v1.0-8/2020
Sanofi and Genzyme are registered in the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM JEWISH EXPONENT
OCTOBER 15, 2020
7