Girls in Tech Hackathon, June 2020
Noticing the impact of COVID-19 — from the many students struggling with educational disruption to the significant lifestyle changes that have made people with special needs and those who are immunocompromised increasingly vulnerable — we designed and developed a virtual platform that is multi-purpose, practical and easy-to-use to mitigate these issues. Help@Home is a platform that connects volunteers and people who are in need. At Help@Home, students can receive immediate feedback from supportive volunteers by posting questions on our homework forum. Kids, people who are immunocompromised, and people with special needs can book a volunteer for grocery and medication pickup with our booking system. Help@Home also provides a judgement-free mental health text line, and a homework forum to support students in grades 4-12.
- Install Nodejs
- Type
npm installin terminal/console in the source folder wherepackage.jsonis located
Frontend is built based on Blk• Design System Bootstrap 4 kit. HTML, CSS and JavaScript are used to customize.
Backend is implemented with Ruby on Rails and PostgreSQL
Booking system relies on Google calendar API
Chat platform utilizes SendBird SDK and Express
The majority of users first create an account before using the Help@Home platform (however, the platform can be viewed by anyone regardless of whether they have an account). From here there are two types of users: ‘volunteers’ and ‘clients,’ which is chosen upon registration.
For clients:
- Rate volunteers after an appointment is completed, creating a more reliable system for other clients to choose volunteers
- Post questions which would later be answered by our volunteers on the homework forum
- Login and chat anonymously on the mental health text line
- View past and upcoming appointments on their profile page
- View volunteers' availability and select a time slot for grocery/medication pickup appointment booking
For volunteers:
- Answer questions on the homework forum
- Moderate and answer direct messages on the mental health text line
- We understand that volunteer hours/times are required as part of students’ community involvement grades by some high schools, thus, Help@Home keeps a count of the number of appointments the volunteers complete on their profile page
- View past and upcoming appointments
- Share their availability if they choose to participate in the grocery/medication pickup appointment service
Backend repo: https://github.com/GAierken/girlsintech_hackathon_backend
Database: https://blooming-wave-77750.herokuapp.com/users and https://blooming-wave-77750.herokuapp.com/appointments
