A 17-year-old Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology student has built a free AI platform that helps neurodivergent job seekers figure out whether a workplace will actually work for them before they apply.

Navya Tuteja, a rising senior at the Fairfax County magnet school, launched Raaha in June after about a year of development, Patch reported Aug. 5. The site has drawn roughly 300 users since going live.

"Getting the opportunity isn't the hardest part," Tuteja told Patch. "It's just ending up in an environment that wasn't built for how you work."

The name comes from the Hindi word for "path." The platform's tagline: "Find Your Way."

How it works

Users take a 15-question quiz covering work preferences, schedule needs and interests. They can choose whether to disclose a diagnosis. Raaha then recommends jobs with a compatibility score, flags what's clear from the posting, suggests questions to ask an employer, offers interview prep tips and lets users download a report. Users can also paste any job listing from the web for analysis.

The site hosts a curated board of more than 1,400 positions and performs its fit analysis across seven dimensions, according to Raaha's website. No account is required, and the tool is free.

Tuteja developed the 15-question assessment with a Fairfax County neurodiversity specialist and other experts who validated the quiz before she built the scoring system into the platform. An app version is pending Apple App Store approval.

Personal motivation, local roots

Tuteja said the idea grew from watching her mother, who is hard of hearing, struggle to get workplace accommodations because her disability wasn't immediately visible. She founded the nonprofit Empower InvisAbilities as a TJHSST freshman to raise awareness about invisible disabilities and serves as its CEO.

In March 2026, she published a children's book, "The Day the Colors Disappeared," aimed at helping young readers understand neurodiversity.

Local context

The platform targets the same school-to-work transition that FCPS's Career and Transition Services addresses through its own programming for students with disabilities. The district's spring 2026 Special Education Family Conference included sessions on post-secondary transition and employment options, run by that office.

Tuteja plans to keep expanding Raaha while applying to colleges, where she hopes to study law. One user told her the platform helped them prepare questions for a data analyst interview. They landed the job.