Inspiration
One of our team members really needed help with PHP, and he had to write on a whiteboard to ask for help. A more experienced student saw the whiteboard and came to help him. Other times, we have been stuck in office hours for long periods of time when people in engineering buildings can quickly help us out. We wanted to create an app that helps university students get quick and efficient academic help from experienced students close by.
What it does
Scout maintains a list of issues that students need help with and sends it out to students close by. If a student sees that they can help someone out, they get access to a messaging system so that the two students can meet up.
How we built it
We tried simultaneously building a Swift app and a website. We finished an HTML/CSS/JS/PHP implementation, but only partially completed the Swift app.
Challenges we ran into
We had a lot of trouble making sure the UI looked alright and presentable to the users. The backend also wasn't really implemented.
Accomplishments that we're proud of
The website front-end is mostly finished, so that both students knowledgeable in their topics, as well as students needing help, can easily use the UI to ask questions or chat to meet up. The design is relatively simple and easy to use.
What we learned
Hackathons take a lot of time, and we should have prioritized perfecting certain functionalities over others to create an effective demo/pitch. We should have focused mostly on the front-end and realized that back-end does not have to be perfected now.
What's next for Scout
Keep continuing to work on the application, especially the mobile application, to eventually release it at Cornell. We think it will be useful for underclassmen especially, who do not know a lot of their classmates and need help finding resources.
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