ONLINE MENTORING PROGRAM PLATFORM

CLIENT - ANU FIFTY50

Our client ANU Fifty50 is a student-run organisation promoting gender equity in STEM. Their vision is to have an equitable STEM pipeline from university to industry and academia, inclusive of all students, regardless of their gender.

The project is to build an Online Mentoring Platform in the form of a website. The intent is to replace the current Wattle platform used by Fifty50. The platform automates the current mentoring program. Younger students (mentees) are paired with older students (mentors), which leads to the formation of inter-year networks. The program is different from other mentoring programs around as it has targeted content and forces the users to be reflective. Users can signup to the platform anytime. Once there is a match, a mentoring relationship is started. Content is released fortnightly and mentees and mentors can meet each other either in person or online.

TEAM

1. Allissa Li - ANU Fifty50 Representative - Client
2. Elena Williams - Tutor
3. Nikita Bhatia - Team Communicator
4. Tyrus Caldeira - Project Manager
5. Nikhil Kumar - Technical Lead
6. Robert Whittaker - Project Lead
7. Yaya Lu - UX Lead
8. Ho Or (Alvis) - UX Assistant
9. Adrian Sweatman - Former Team Member
10. Emily Campbell - Former Client

STAKEHOLDERS

1. ANU Fifty50
2. Potential mentees and mentors

CLIENT EXPECTATIONS

1. In terms of the website, the client expectations are a functioning prototype by the end of Semester 1, 2017 and a tested version ready for release at the end of Semester 2, 2017.
2. The client expects the team to communicate constantly through Slack and regular meetings.
3. The client is happy with the progress so far and understands why the MVP (Minimal Viable Product) was delayed. The Client (Allissa) and the our team are currently working to find a time to show users from ANU Fifty50 how to use our product.

HOW OUR PROJECT IS MAKING THINGS BETTER FOR THE CLIENT?

The Online Mentoring Platform automates the mentoring program for our client. Currently, the mentoring program uses Wattle and Google Docs for management. There is an administrative overhead with this as everything has to be done manually. This also limits the program to be just at the ANU. Through the platform, the overhead is reduced and it also gives rise to the possibility of expansion to other universities.

VALUE DELIVERED TO OUR CLIENT SINCE THE LAST PROJECT AUDIT

1. Since the last project audit, we have been able to deploy our website so it is ready as soon as we are able to train our Client into how the website works and how to use it. This means they can take control, start a test Mentoring Program in which they can have a few mentees, mentors and admins to control the site within their committee and give us any feedback using our GitHub Issues page. If you would like to view our current deployed site, this is the link : http://u5949399.pythonanywhere.com
2. We have fixed some pairing issues in which it didn't show admins who is paired with who, and if they are a mentor or not. This makes it much easier for admins to see now as they can find out exactly who is paired with who and if they are a mentor or mentee.
3. During week 4 we held a user testing session in which we got useful feedback from the users of our website. This feedback showed us how our users actually use our site and if they use it the way we intended for them to use it. Logs of the different issues we found were taken down and added to our GitHub issues page. Our team has been working on fixing these issues over time. Documents regarding our user testing can be found at this link : User Testing Documents
4. Within the last few weeks, we have been able to complete the tasks as part of our Minimal Viable Product. This gives our Client the ability to run the mentoring program exactly the way they used to with some small added differences with it being online, such as viewable PDF's and videos and easily finding mentor and mentee details. An outline of what was included in our MVP can be found at think link : Minimal Viable Product

EFFECTIVE AND APPROPRIATE DECISION MAKING

Our last project audit gave insight into how we log the decisions we make. We have now created a Decision Paper document in which it encompasses all the decisions we have made since Week 1 of Semester 2. This decision paper helps us keep a track of all the important decisions we have made such as choosing to open source our project and delivering the minimal viable product to our client. A link to this document can be found here : Decision Paper

TOOLS USED

1. Github for source code and version control.
2. Slack for team and client communication.
3. Google Drive for file management.
4. Trello for project management and organisation.
5. Python and Django for backend development.
6. HTML, CSS and JavaScript for frontend development.

HOW TO RUN THE PROJECT

Change directory to project and follow the instructions: https://github.com/Nikita1710/Fifty50-Mentoring-Staging/blob/master/project/README.md

PROJECT MILESTONES

The link to our Trello board for Semester 2 can be found here : Timeline Semester 2

RESOURCES

The client ANU Fifty50 is providing the team with required resources such as design documents for the website, content to upload etc.

POTENTIAL COSTS

The only cost will be associated with hosting the website on a server. The team is acquiring free hosting from Python Anywhere for a year and after that, the client is going to cover those costs.

DOCUMENTATION / TECHNICAL ARTEFACTS

GITHUB REPOSITORY

Our source code is stored at: https://github.com/Nikita1710/ANUFifty50-Online-Mentoring-Platform

TRELLO PAGE

Our Trello page is at: https://trello.com/techlauncher2017onlinementoringplatform

GOOGLE DRIVE

1. Root Folder: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B90o2KWKXkDqbWQ3clltaFdBVHc?usp=sharing
2. Tutor Meetings: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B90o2KWKXkDqbGk5eEI1eVJXMUk?usp=sharing
3. Client Meetings: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B90o2KWKXkDqVFU4Q012NGtQVW8?usp=sharing
4. Team Meetings: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B541nY2e_DZodlpEWnY5Tzh1M0E?usp=sharing
5. Project Documents: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0Bw7MUyh12MoYSmVybWtVOS1GU2s?usp=sharing
6. User Testing Documents : https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0Bw7MUyh12MoYRno4VWNxVEtOaXc?usp=sharing
7. Lecture Notes : https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B90o2KWKXkDqSFNJSzJUOWt4RVU?usp=sharing
8. Decision Paper : https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XtujnVUvyAoELIFgfqHR2vYqOldP2CBT82ymI5FR2tA/edit?usp=sharing

CONTACT

If you don't have access to any of the above links, please contact Nikita ([email protected]) or Tyrus ([email protected]) for access!