A young Panamanian entrepreneur has launched Heartbrookies, a venture designed to help university students juggle the often-conflicting demands of studying and working. The initiative, spotlighted in Telemetro’s “Mentes Brillantes” series, grew directly out of the founder’s own frustrating experience trying to balance both after finishing high school.
What Happened
Heartbrookies is the brainchild of Ismael Assady, who explained that after completing his secondary education he attempted to study and work at the same time — a goal that quickly turned into what he described as an odyssey. Rigid class schedules and difficult work hours made combining the two nearly impossible.
Rather than give up on either ambition, Assady decided to create a solution. Heartbrookies is structured as an entrepreneurship platform that allows young university students with complicated schedules to find work opportunities that fit around their academic commitments.
The project was featured by Telemetro as part of its coverage of promising young entrepreneurs in Panama, giving Heartbrookies national visibility as an example of student-driven innovation.
Background
The challenge Assady faced is familiar to thousands of young Panamanians. Many university students in the country need income to finance their studies and support their families, yet traditional part-time jobs often demand fixed hours that clash with class schedules, exams, and study time.
Entrepreneurship has increasingly been promoted in Panama as a pathway for young people, with media outlets, universities, and government programs highlighting youth-led ventures. Features like Telemetro’s “Mentes Brillantes” segment aim to showcase these initiatives and inspire others to develop their own solutions to everyday problems.
Assady’s story follows a classic entrepreneurial pattern: identifying a personal pain point — the difficulty of working while studying — and building a business model around solving it, not just for himself but for other students in the same situation.
What This Means for Panama
Heartbrookies addresses a real and widespread need among Panama’s student population, where balancing education and employment is a common obstacle to completing degrees or gaining early work experience. If the venture scales, it could make a meaningful difference in student retention and youth employment.
The project also reflects a broader trend of Panamanian youth creating their own opportunities rather than waiting for the job market to accommodate them. Ventures like this can help normalize flexible, student-friendly work arrangements among local employers.
For readers, the story is a reminder that Panama’s startup ecosystem continues to produce young founders tackling practical problems. Students facing similar scheduling struggles may find in Heartbrookies both a service and an example worth following as the venture develops.
This story was originally reported by Telemetro.