The CITRIS and the Banatao Institute Tech for Social Good Program provides funding support to UC Merced undergraduate students, groups, teams or organizations developing hardware, software, events or programs that support healthy, sustainable, connected, and equitable livelihoods in the United States and abroad.
PhinesChen is a project that aimed at transforming the Merced County Food Bank (MCFB) website and database by tackling three main issues. First, the team of three UC Merced Computer Science and Engineering majors created a brand new site with updated information about the bank, a map to help locate food distribution sites to anyone on the website, and a login system for the admins and users. Second, the team digitalized the storage system by creating a backend database to store inventory information and added a front-end component for easily inputting data. Then, they built a tracker to stay informed when a shipment will reach the food bank or reach a distribution site. Lastly, they created an administrative user interface so all data related to MCFB can be tracked including amount of food, money donated/spent, requests/donation forms, and much more. All these changes were done on one web platform with intuitive and attractive design intended for ease of operation.
