Hawaii DOE Tracker
03 Dec 2022
Software Engineering II
If ICS 314: Software Engineering I was all about learning the skills to develop an application, ICS 414: Software Engineering II consisted of implementing those learnt skills for a real client. Hawaii’s Department of Education decided to work alongside Dr. Moore’s class to help improve the current legislative tracker that they were using. Its current application consisted of backlog issues, inefficient, and outdated design, and it was our role as software engineer rookies to develop a modernize and efficient version of it.
Communication skills >= Coding skills
Communication skills is just as important, if not more, than programming skills. One’s inability to communicate with others would just render their coding skills useless. Creative ideas, suggestions, and comments would remain inconclusive if one’s communication skills are nonexistent. Well known computer scientists like Bill Gates, Grace Hopper, and Tim Berners-Lee wouldn’t be recognizable as they are today if they didn’t communicate their ideas with others.
Fortunately enough, communication within my team, the hi-doe-tracker team, wasn’t an issue. Creative ideas were discussed with one another, and suggestions and comments were easily provided to help each other. Although I could personally have been better at communicating with the team myself, I appreciate the great communication skills that most of my team carried. I was able to recognize that I need to improve my communication skills, as well as my programming skills from this class.
Legislative Process
Understanding how bills are passed for the DOE was a detrimental aspect in building the application. Our team had to understand the process of bill passing, testimonies, and approval process in order to develop the pages within the application. It wasn’t until this project that I realized how intricate the process of a bill passing is and its implementation for all public schools in all islands. There are many loops that the DOE office has to go through to provide improvements for teachers and students of Hawaii.
Our team’s github page can be found here.