Students at London-Steveston secondary school may soon have an easy-to-use smartphone app that connects them to all the after-school and extra-curricular activities on offer.
That’s because students Shir Dayan, Ved Ballary, Paul Tang, Claudia Tong and Leean Wu have created the award-winning Shark Connect, an app that allows students to see what club meetings and school events are being hosted during the school year.
“We created this app to bridge the communication gap between students. A lot of times there are different clubs that post events on different social media platforms; announcements here and there, and even word of mouth. So, it’s confusing sometimes for students, and we wanted to simplify this by putting it all on one platform,” said Dayan, a Grade 10 student.
Apps are a portal for information and offer services, such as finding a restaurant, conducting online banking, exercising more efficiently or checking the weather.
They may be created for social purposes and/or monetary value.
Dayan said school administrators may pay the group a nominal fee for the app in hopes of implementing it for students to use, via a registration system — to avoid abuse.
Students can then log in to add club events or simply check what’s going on in the school. This will avoid having to check various platforms, or depend on noon-hour announcements.
Shark Connect was the overall winner of the Game of Apps competition hosted by the Richmond School District and organized by Richmond-based computer software developers and designers, who form the non-profit Institute of Applied Design and Technology Education.
Nearly 100 Richmond high school students were honoured Saturday for their participation in the three-month competition.
Independent computer software developer Roland Tecson, a 1986 McNair alumni, who earned a degree in computer science at the University of B.C. in 1990, unveiled the first annual Glen Bussey Trophy.
Bussey, a long-time Richmond teacher, was Tecson’s computer teacher in Grade 7 who played an instrumental role in leading Tecson to a successful, innovative career. Bussey presented the Shark Connect team with the Glen Bussey Trophy.
Inidividual awards for Outstanding Designer went to Joy Yang, Eric Tran and Joanna Liang, all of Richmond secondary. The Best Developer Award went to Hamza Rasheed and Bronwen Merchant, both of McMath secondary. The Best Design Award went to McMath students dubbed Team Cipher (Brad Peng, Hod Kimhi, Katelyn Snell, Michelle Wong, Spencer Leslie). Team Pascal (Rebecca Lee, Kevin Tang, William Wang, Jeff Yu, Martin Yushko ) at McRoberts took home the Best Development Award.
Various distinguished guests were invited to present the awards to the students, including MLA Rick Glumac, Parliamentary Secretary for Technology. Members of Science World, Emily Carr University and Amazon were also on hand alongside local MLAs and school trustees.
