An Application Infrastructure to Support the TRIO Upward Bound Program
Location
Hager-Lubbers Exhibition Hall
Description
PURPOSE: The TRIO Upward Bound program helps high school students from underserved backgrounds reach their potential by building their academic skills, motivation, and self-confidence necessary for success in a college. Upward Bound staff are responsible for tracking attendance for students by carrying separate files to each location and recording information in them. This is extremely cumbersome and error-prone. Staff members have the additional burden of counting the number of hours each student spent on a location, meals ordered on each day, placing a food request order, and preparing a manual report for scholarship purposes. The purpose of building the Summer UB application was to support Upward Bound staff members by reducing the manual effort needed to take attendance and manage information. PROCEDURES: Once I identified the problem, I tried to analyze it and then used my knowledge of mobile and application development to solve this problem by creating mockup screens and database constraints. OUTCOME: Summer UB makes it easier for a staff member to track any student if they get separated at any location during the tour. The mobile app also makes it easier for staff members to track the number of meals served per day and make an appropriate decision in placing food services orders the next day. The Summer UB application also provides a web dashboard for staff that produces detailed historical student activity and meal reports, it also helps staff members to modify and update student activity if necessary. IMPACT: The Upward Bound staff will pilot test the Summer UB app in Summer 2017, but the project has been planned to be scalable for other schools and universities.
An Application Infrastructure to Support the TRIO Upward Bound Program
Hager-Lubbers Exhibition Hall
PURPOSE: The TRIO Upward Bound program helps high school students from underserved backgrounds reach their potential by building their academic skills, motivation, and self-confidence necessary for success in a college. Upward Bound staff are responsible for tracking attendance for students by carrying separate files to each location and recording information in them. This is extremely cumbersome and error-prone. Staff members have the additional burden of counting the number of hours each student spent on a location, meals ordered on each day, placing a food request order, and preparing a manual report for scholarship purposes. The purpose of building the Summer UB application was to support Upward Bound staff members by reducing the manual effort needed to take attendance and manage information. PROCEDURES: Once I identified the problem, I tried to analyze it and then used my knowledge of mobile and application development to solve this problem by creating mockup screens and database constraints. OUTCOME: Summer UB makes it easier for a staff member to track any student if they get separated at any location during the tour. The mobile app also makes it easier for staff members to track the number of meals served per day and make an appropriate decision in placing food services orders the next day. The Summer UB application also provides a web dashboard for staff that produces detailed historical student activity and meal reports, it also helps staff members to modify and update student activity if necessary. IMPACT: The Upward Bound staff will pilot test the Summer UB app in Summer 2017, but the project has been planned to be scalable for other schools and universities.