2012-2013 SLP Projects {#intro}
This page lists the 7 projects that were developed during the fall 2012 and spring 2013 semesters. There were 39 students enrolled, split among 7 projects. Note that the micro-volunteering website is a continuation of the project from the previous spring semester, and only had 3 students in that group. The other 6 projects had 6 students each. Formally, it was a CS 4501 course in both semesters, as the current course numbers (CS 4970 and CS 4971) had not been approved yet. 28 of the 39 students used this as their senior thesis project.
Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville {#habitat}
Habitat for Humanity of Greater Charlottesville (HFHGC) works to create simple, decent, affordable housing in partnership with low-income families, volunteers and the communities of greater Charlottesville.
The project is to develop a website that allows for the display of houses built by Habitat. Once the data is entered, one can see the houses in the area, or find houses built that cost under some amount, etc. Private information (such as the people who live in the houses) won't be entered. This will be used to "show off" what Habitat has done in the community. Furthermore, a smartphone app is to be developed that allows for additional features, such as using the GPS.
Virginia Discovery Museum {#vadm}
The Virginia Discovery Museum is a hands-on children's museum, with exhibits on the arts, sciences, humanities, history and nature.
The project is to develop a web-based volunteer portal that allows for shift sign-up, scheduling, data queries, etc. The moderator will be the gallery manager ("GM") as that is the person that manages the volunteers. The primary desired functionality of this system is the scheduling.
Center for Nonprofit Excellence Data Dashboard {#cnedd}
The Center for Nonprofit Excellence is the area's primary resource for nonprofit management, leadership and collaboration. CNE strengthens nonprofits by sharing information, providing training and professional development and encouraging collaboration to enable a healthy, vibrant community.
The project is to develop a dashboard program to help CNE with their tasks. The system will have two integrated (but somewhat unconnected) parts. The first part is a survey designer that will allow the creation of surveys (similar to end-of-course evaluations), scanning in of the surveys (like Scantron, but optical), and analysis of the data. The second is a data analysis tool that will access a MySQL database extract data in a presentable format.
Virginia Institute of Autism {#via}
The Virginia Institute of Autism (VIA) is a non-profit organization providing a day-school and other resources for families, educators and health professionals seeking services, training or information about autism and evidence based interventions.
The project is to develop a program that will determine the schedule that assigns teachers to students. Most students work one-on-one with a teacher in a given period; there are 6 periods throughout the day. Normal teacher absences (and, to a lesser extent, student absences) necessitate some differences to the schedule each day. Sometimes teachers have to handle two students, such as during other teacher's lunch times, and when a teacher is absent. Other constraints apply as well (teachers stay in their classroom; some students can't be in a group; some students do not work well with some teachers; etc.).
giv2giv Micro-Endowment Website {#giv2giv}
giv2giv gives charitable donors their own personal micro-trust fund. Donors contribute anywhere from $20 to $2,000,000 per month and giv2giv will invest the funds as they wish; donations to one's favorite charities are made out of that fund. While $500 may not donate much on a annual basis, many such small mini-endowments will have a large aggregate effect.
This project will develop the website to allow for these types of contributions.
Camp Holiday Trails {#cht}
Camp Holiday Trails is a caring community committed to empowering, encouraging and educating campers with chronic illnesses, their families and healthcare professionals.
The project is to develop a website that allows for two types of scheduling. The first is scheduling of staff work shifts. Staff members have certain activities that they can (or are certified to) lead, so the staff working on a given day determines the activities that are available for campers. The second scheduling is campers' choices of activities based on what is available on that day.
Micro-volunteering website {#cnemv}
There are many tasks that nonprofits in our community need being done, and many require specialized skills. Perhaps it is installing a printer driver on a computer, or re-wiring an electrical outlet, or fixing a plumbing leak. Hiring a professional to resolve the issue can run into the hundreds of dollars. But there are many skilled volunteers in the community -- many of them professionals themselves -- that would be willing to help out with such tasks. How, then, does one connect the skilled volunteers with the nonprofits who need their expertise?
The answer is a micro-volunteering website that allows volunteers to register their skills and passions, and nonprofits to register their needs. The site will then match up the tasks that need completion by the nonprofits with the volunteers that can perform those tasks. A typical micro-volunteer task would take an hour or so; something that somebody could do on their way home from work. There are many such websites available today, but they are all either virtual tasks (i.e., fully computer-based), such as sparked.com, or are for specific regions of the country that are not Charlottesville.
