The application Class Notebook developed by Unicamp undergraduate students Agatha Maria Pedroso, Davi Vinicius Cunha and João Vitor Pimentel da Silva took first prize at the 3rd Hackathon in Campinas. Aiming to be a communication channel between parents and teachers, without losing sight of the focus on the student, the app mixes characteristics of games and social networks. More than the prize of 15 thousand reais, which must be invested in equipment, the group enjoys the expectation of having their project put into practice in the city's schools. The award was presented on Saturday (9), at the IMA Cultural Theater, and was attended by the rector of Unicamp, Marcelo Knobel, as well as the vice-mayor, Henrique Magalhães Teixeira, and the secretary of education, Solange Villon Kohn Pelicer.
“To make this communication between parents and teachers happen, we take as a premise that everything revolves around the student. They want to communicate, because they want to work on the student’s evolution. So, we needed to do something that was attractive to the student, for this to happen”, said Davi, who is studying the 3rd year of the Computer Science course, at the Computing Institute (IC) at Unicamp. In order to attract students, the application works like a game, where teachers propose challenges and students are rewarded according to the completion of tasks.
Among the functions available in the tool, which required a considerable degree of complexity from the developers, are a notification system, which notifies in real time the submission of a new challenge, a message or news on the agenda and a chat, where parents and teachers can communicate communicate directly.
Another aspect of the app highlighted in the award, according to the team, was the design, created by Agatha, who is studying her 3rd year in Architecture and Urbanism, at the Faculty of Civil Engineering, Architecture and Urbanism (Fec) at Unicamp. “The design wins people over very easily,” she explained.
The programming marathon was promoted by the City of Campinas, through the Municipal Department of Education and the company IMA (Informática de Municípios Associados). In this edition, the challenge was to develop tools to face some of the main issues in the city's public education system.
