AFFORDABLE’s mission is to connect these networks of healthcare and health supporting organizations into a portal, while concurrently reducing the complexity of the process for the individuals in need. Part of this process is the easy fluid transfer of financial aid, and this applied to the COVID-19 Relief Programs that AFFORDABLE has worked to coordinate and sponsor. With the aid we have collected, we wanted to use the AFFORDABLE portal to directly transfer financial aid after their information and request was evaluated.
The next challenge was improving the current Health Utilizing Grant system (HUGs). Prior teams have implemented a prototype of how microgrants could be build and delivered to users applying for need in the system. This team worked on refining this process and making it more accessible to the common user. Now, there are only a few parameters that the user would need to fill out to apply for aid. Then, the donor can manage their HUG more effectively using a similar dashboard system that would allow for easy management.
The main features of our application has gone through multiple iterations. Each iteration makes improvements to the interface, features, capabilities, options, and security of the main application This team with The Ohio State University focused on building out the features servicing organizations. They now have more ability than ever to be able to create and service grants within Affordable, and can set up several customizable features to best fit their needs. Furthermore, they created a frontward facing page that will serve as the portal’s homepage. This will allow the general public to search all the different programs in our system, and find possible options that best fit their needs. This will also gain these charities more visibility for their work, and attract more users to adopting our system for delivering healthcare aid.
The team did a fantastic job improving and debugging our health utilizing grant system for our live deployment this year. Read the experiences from the interview with Paige Moden and her experience working on this project. We look forward to continuing the capabilities of our application in 2022.
Where are you currently enrolled in college?
The Ohio State University
What is your development team name? Who is your professor?
We are the Budget Badgers! We’re led by Professor John Bishop.
Who were the members on your team?
Zach Dudzik, Paige Moden, Daniel Neff, Steven Zhao
What was the goal of your software engineering project?
Our team focused on refining and adding additional functionality to the Affordable web application.
What tool/features did you have to create?
Our major milestones included implementing an applicant filtering algorithm, limiting the permissions of members within an organization, creating public facing landing pages to show all organizations and available grants, and adjusting the grant fund management features.
What skills did you learn during the semester?
Wireframing in Figma, and communicating with the application server through a robust client.
What did you enjoy about working with Affordable?
I enjoyed being able to discuss the product’s direction with Affordable’s more permanent staff and see our team’s ideas incorporated into the current vision.
What are your future career plans?
I will begin working at JPMorgan Chase as a Software Engineering Program full-timer in July of 2022. Eventually, I hope to receive more education in UX and transition to a hands-on user-oriented role.
Team Bios:
My name is Zach Dudzik, I’m a 5th year CSE student focused in Software Development. I’m interested in web application development and have experience the last 3 years at Hyland Software developing in Angular/Nodejs as well as in C#/WPF. Outside of work I’m a runner and avid reader, and I love to cook!
I am a fourth-year in Computer Science and Engineering, graduating at the end of the Spring 2022 semester. UI design really interests me, so I added a minor in Communication Technology to learn more about how people interact with tech. I have interned for Northrop Grumman and JPMorgan Chase as a software engineer. For NGC I focused on automated testing and documentation. During my time at JPMC, I built a web app with React and MariaDB, while spending time on code coverage in JUnit and JEST. I have a cat named Nani who loves to be on Zoom calls!
My name is Daniel Neff, I’m a 6th year CIS student set to graduate in December 2021. I’m interested in software development and love coding in C#, Python, and Java. I also have recently discovered an interest in cybersecurity and cryptography. In my free time I love watching movies, and also am a part time manager at a movie theater!
My name is Steven Zhao and I’m a 5th year CSE student looking to graduate in December 2021. I am also minoring in Statistics. I am interested in Network Security and Web Apps.
