Computer Students Help Community

Groups of Grand Valley State University computer students are using their senior projects to help out some community organizations like Habitat for Humanity and the Grand Rapids Children's Museum.

Around 32 students are doing computer work for the organizations for their capstone class. The project was the brainchild of Dr. Roger Ferguson, an associate professor in Grand Valley's department of Computer Science and Information Systems.

'The idea was to get them to go work for the community, solving computer problems for non-profit organizations,' Ferguson said. 'They're doing good things.'

The project has students doing meaningful work for their senior projects, rather than busywork.

'Most of the time, they do projects on camps, and they toss them away when they're done,' Ferguson said.

Two groups are working on projects for Habitat for Humanity, two groups are working on projects for the Children's Museum, and a group is doing work for the Grand Rapids Community Media Center.

'Everyone on my team is grateful for this opportunity to work with a non-profit organization. We get to make a difference and leave our footprint with an organization that plays such a great role in the community,' said Tom Kale, 34 of Raleigh, N.C. His group is building a database for the Children's Museum that will help keep track of field trips and group visits.

Those sentiments were echoed by Tina Ehlizevak, who's working on a team creating a tracking application for Habitat for Humanity, to track the houses the organization builds or renovates.

'I'm really happy that we're doing this,' said Tina Ehlizevak, a 23-year-old information systems major from Wyoming. 'One of the exciting things about this is being able to help people while learning at the same time. It's also great to be creating an application that is actually going to be used.'

Jan Stone, Community Relations Director for the museum, said the organization is pleased with the results of the program so far.

'This gives us an opportunity to do something that just wouldn't get done. This is something that is really necessary for the museum to function. But being a non-profit, we just don't have the opportunity to purchase software to do these sorts of things. This provides an opportunity that otherwise we just wouldn't have.'