1) UNC Student Congress website
I inherited responsibility for this from Val when he finished his Ph.D. program in May. This summer, I look to implement:
- an attendance system. easy to update, easy to look at [so that students can see if their representative is on a term of leave, hasn't been to 3 meetings and should be impeached, etc.] Ideally this will be integrated with the 'current members' page.
- easier to find locations for current bills/ resolutions. Unfortunately, this will probably mean sacrifice of ease of upload. Currently, they're just dumped to one location.
I'm working on this with my friend Max . The use-case? The current Student Code is in latex, which makes it look beautiful, but also makes it non-trivial to update. The Student Body Secretary is responsible for updating this, but this past school year (Raynor administration) never did. Max and I, for differing reasons, would like to see the Student Code be updated more frequently, and thus, to this end, instead of just placing blanket demands (and impeachment threats), we're going to try to make it easier on the SBS.
Progress so far? We've barely agreed on the tools that we're going to use, but have one follower on our assembla account! Woah.
It's been pointed out to me by my good friend Mac, that since he was the last SBS who actually updated the damn thing, we should be talking to him more about our implementation. I'm a little nervous about working with Mac and Max on the same project, though, because despite the similarities in their names (or perhaps due to?), their ideas on UI/technology in general cannot be melded harmoniously. At the core, Max is a big Apple fan and Mac is a linux user. Everything else stems from that... I think I could work with either of them on a project, but working with both? Maybe a lesson in diplomacy, or maybe a lesson in just making decisions and running with them...
3) Eve Carson Scholarship website
In exchange for a nice seat on the Executive Board for the Eve Carson Scholarship, I have agreed to web-design/technology-implement for the Carson Scholarship for the next year.
Despite knowing next to nothing about web design (have you /seen/ my website? http://www.unc.edu/~zhoum), even less about graphic design (seriously), I am excited and thrilled about this project.
First, I've had at least 3 people ask me to design websites for them this past year (the perils of going to a large school with only 100 CS majors...), and been forced to refuse (although admittedly, I probably would've refused anyway). It will be nice knowing something (and having solid proof of knowing something!) about web design. Second, I am so so excited about this scholarship.
The Eve Carson Scholarship is a senior-year + one summer full merit-based scholarship that's intended to reward people who have blossomed at UNC. The idea behind it is that not everyone is a high-school hot shot who can get the Morehead or Robertson, but /so/ many people do great things at and for Carolina while here. The idea of a 'reward' for these students is simply amazing to me. What a great idea. On top of that, this gives money for an amazing, independetly-designed summer experience for the scholar(s) /plus/ the freedom to not worry about money their senior year! --allowing them to do even more amazing, wonderful things at Carolina and/or free them up for fully investigating jobs, fellowships, etc. : ]]] (I'm very fortunate to be living with the first Carson scholar next year... hah.)
I'm super excited about helping this Scholarship grow, and it's a tremendous opportunity to get to be on a Scholarship exec. board in college, especially in the initial stages of a scholarship like this, where I get to be part of defining what this is. : ]
Pumped.
On top of this, I'm working at IBM this summer in Toronto for the DB2 group doing tooling for their test division. (phew, quite a sentence). I'm creating the first resume I've had in 2 years, and making myself a better website as a primer for getting started on the Scholarship website.
Hah. Summer of tech...
