Student Buddy

Inspiration

As students ourselves, we kept hitting the same problem: study notes were scattered, summaries were slow to make, and practice quizzes were hard to build. We decided to solve that by building a single app that turns notes into summaries, quizzes, and a smart study plan

What it does

Student Buddy helps students upload notes, get instant AI summaries, generate practice quizzes, chat with an AI tutor, and keep a weekly study plan with Pomodoro support. It also tracks streaks, study hours, and progress in one dashboard.

How we built it

We built a full-stack web app using React + Vite for the frontend and Express + Prisma for the backend. AI features use a local Ollama-style model, notes are uploaded to Cloudinary, and the client uses TanStack Router + React Query for fast interactivity.

Challenges we ran into

The hardest part was making AI output stable and usable, especially when generating structured summaries and quizzes. We also had to connect uploads, note parsing, and auth so the app felt smooth for real students.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We created a working student workflow from note upload to quiz generation and planning, with AI-powered study support. It’s a full project that solves a real pain point we personally experienced.

What we learned

We learned how to design prompts for reliable AI responses, integrate a local model into a web app, and build a polished front-to-back student product. We also got better at making study tools that actually help users stay organized.