EngageBest

UMD EngageBest Project

Modern solution for attendance and participation tracking

Created by Fei Yuan, Theobald Rousset, Sneha Patel, Tushar Dubey, David Kim, and Franklin N Ngongang

What is EngageBest?

EngageBest is a dynamic web application developed to empower university professors/instructors in enhancing engagement within their classes. Its primary function is to collect valuable data on student attendance and participation for large classes where traditional methods may prove inefficient or disruptive. The project's core principle is to offer instructors an intuitive, reliable, and non-intrusive way to collect and access data related to student engagement. The project incorporates geolocation data and other metrics to minimize falsified entries and utilizes a wide variety of frontend and backend libraries to ensure pleasant user experiences. The result is a novel and robust tool for professors to use in the classroom.

Create dynamic course pages

With EngageBest, you can turn simple CSV files into full course pages with the click of a button, set up with students, sections, and teaching assistants automatically added. You can use these pages to access student attendance details, past lectures, and other data with ease. Once a course is created, students and TAs will be able to see it in their dashboards too.

professor_dashboard professor_course_page student_dashboard

Host lectures and discussions

Keep attendance easily with our lecture hosting feature. Have students sign in effortlessly by scanning a uniquely generated QR code for the session. Enable geolocation checking to verify student attendance. Toggle and configure functionalities with our hosting interface and save presets for later uses.

professor_session_start professor_qr

Record particpation

During an ongoing lecture, keep track of all attending student and record noteworthy participations with the click of a button. Search for students using their names or uniquely generated session IDs. If you like, you can also add or remove students manually.

professor_session professor_session_search

Access data with intuitive interfaces

See all your past lectures and freely modify them. Or go even deeper and access a comprehensive master table with all attendance data that you can filter and reorder. Export them as CSV files for any data analysis purposes. Even the students can view a generalized overview on how they're doing in class.

professor_session_end professor_history professor_dataview student_course_page

Interested?

Our project is currently in pilot status pending further evaluation and performance tuning. For more information about this project or its creators, consider contacting:

Creators:

  • Fei Yuan: ericyuan@terpmail.umd.edu, yuanfei20160811@gmail.com
  • Theobald Olivier Rousset: trousset@terpmail.umd.edu
  • Sneha J Patel: snehap22@umd.edu
  • Tushar Dubey: tdubey@terpmail.umd.edu
  • David Hyang-Mock Kim: kimdavid@terpmail.umd.edu
  • Franklin Nkokam Ngongang: fnkokamn@terpmail.umd.edu

Project Director: Jim Purtilo, Computer Science Department, UM

Client: Larry Herman, Computer Science Department, UM