CheckIn

CheckIn connects those seeking to do good with volunteer opportunities and organizations.

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Inspiration

Our team firmly believes that one of the best ways to connect with others is through acts of service. Coming out of the pandemic, volunteers will be crucial to supporting those hit the hardest. Although many people often want to volunteer in their communities, their schedules are too variable to commit to a steady volunteer role. CheckIn solves this issue by “gig-ifying” volunteer work, connecting those looking to help with work whenever and wherever it is available.

What it does

CheckIn is a web application that "gig-ifies" volunteering by connecting those looking to volunteer and help out in their local communities with local community groups. CheckIn has an intuitive and easy to use interface in order to make the user experience as seamless as possible. Our features include the ability to find volunteer opportunities using the integrated app or by using a time slider to select the time. As well our app provides the ability to find local community group to join for those looking for a more permanent role. We also use the Twilio API in order to send SMS messages which confirm participation and remind volunteers of upcoming commitments. Under the hood, users are able to create accounts and with these accounts see all their recorded volunteering history. Ultimately, CheckIn simplifies the volunteering experience to connect could-be volunteers with the organizations that need them.

How we built it

We built the UI with React.js framework. For user authentication, we used Node.js and Express.js to link our frontend content with MongoDB. We built the Check-In feature with the Twilio SMS API, and used Google Maps API for the interactive map. Lastly, we also used a lot of React libraries/APIs, which were very fun to learn!

Challenges we ran into

The first challenge we ran into was that one of our team members was unable to participate, leaving us short-handed for the duration of the hackathon. The biggest challenge we faced however was a lack of experience and prior knowledge. Coming into the hackathon, only one member of our team had worked with React and we had no backend knowledge and learning these skills as we went significantly slowed down our work rate.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Despite having a short-handed, inexperienced team, we were able to develop a fully fledged web application with both frontend and backend. Central to our goal was creating an intuitive and enjoyable user experience in order to make volunteering simple, and we are happy to say that we met this goal. Another goal was to fully implement all features of our app within the duration of the hackathon, a feat which we finally accomplished at 5:45am Sunday morning.

What we learned

Coming into this project our team only had one member experienced with React and no backend experience. This meant that we had to learn React, as well as responsive web design in order to create an enjoyable user experience. Secondly, we had to learn how to use API's, specifically the google maps API and Twilio. Finally, we needed to learn how create a backend and integrate it into our application.

What's next for CheckIn

In order to realize its vision of “gig-ified” volunteer work, CheckIn’s next steps include building iOS and Android applications to increase convenience for users. Additionally, CheckIn relies on a large network of users, both volunteers and volunteer opportunity organizers, in order to deliver its service. Its next steps will also include an advertising campaign and potential promotional period in order to boost its user base.

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