TransferBuddy AI

Inspiration 💡

Community College Students are expected to independently navigate complex systems of 2,100+ transfer pathways with little to no clear guidance leaving many intelligent, well-capable students struggling. As a result only about 33% transfer to a four-year institution, and only 16% earn a bachelor’s degree within six years of starting college highlighting a significant issue. This affects more than 2.1 million students, within California alone. By creating TransferBuddy AI, we wish to combat this issue, providing services accessible to everyone bridging the gap in knowledge necessary to transfer for higher education.

What TransferBuddy AI does 🤖

The Transfer AI service responds to user needs regarding everything transfer. Whether an international or residential student the AI has the answers including methods to stay most competitive for transfer. The service includes a Student Edplan like transfer roadmap service that users can customize their transfer ready schedule without the need for month-long waits for a counselor appointment.

How we built it ⚙️

TransferBuddy Ai was developed using Claude code within the VS Co-Pilot AI system to work with our initial front end design and ideas for our backend utilizing Gemini AI. Our frontend was designed and iterated in Figma before being built out with React and Vite. We leveraged official ASSIST articulation data to ground the AI’s responses in accurate, institution-specific course requirements across UC and CSU campuses.

Challenges we ran into 🚧

Some of our challenges were that we struggled with formatting the AI service on a website on FIGMA originally wanting to provide services for International and residential students. We pivoted to include a long page with an AI answering important questions while also including alternate resources towards the bottom.

Accomplishments that we're proud of 🏆

Created a fully functioning full-stack web application for the first time using an API. We created a service that can genuinely help community college students with everything regarding their transfer process with a free AI service and transfer roadmap.

What we learned 📚

We gained hands-on experience as we learned how to successfully implement AI and APIs into a full-stack web application. We also learned how to translate complex and real-world academic data into a user-friendly website. We also deepened our understanding of the California transfer system, including ASSIST articulation agreements, CAL-GETC, TAG programs, etc. which helped us shape how we designed our website.

What's next for TransferBuddy AI 🚀

We would like to adjust the transfer roadmap so the TransferBuddy AI is capable of autogenerating a plan within seconds, then after the client can adjust to their liking.

Some other features that we would like to implement in the future are: “What are my chances?” admissions predictor based on GPA, major, and target school Deadline Reminder System that has automated alerts for important deadlines such as TAG, CSU/UC applications, FASFA, etc. Peer mentorship matching that can connect current CCC students with successful transfers at their target school Implementation of TransferBuddy AI into a mobile application