Bison Connect

Your University Admissions Guide

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Inspiration

Bison Connect was inspired by the desire to harness cutting-edge technology to bridge the information gap between Howard University and its prospective freshmen. We know it can be hard to find your way through all the available resources, so this platform is all about making that journey smoother and more connected.

What it does

Bison Connect serves as an intelligent assistant, providing prospective students with swift and relevant responses to their queries. It uses technology like web scraping, Azure Cognitive Search, and OpenAI's language model to give a full search and chat service, allowing Howard University's community to find the information they need quickly.

How we built it

We started by gathering data through web scraping and organizing it with MongoDB. Then, we moved to Azure Cosmos DB to take advantage of its ability to handle lots of data from all over the world. Azure Cognitive Search helps us look through data easily, and OpenAI's GPT helps us chat in a way that feels human. We put it all together with a Flask-based API and a user-friendly React website.

Challenges we ran into

Interfacing between different technologies presented its challenges. Ensuring real-time updates in the database and maintaining the relevance of search indices required meticulous tuning. Crafting responses that were not only accurate but also engaging pushed the limits of our AI's capabilities. All of us were new to Azure so learning new technologies while doing it has been a great experience.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

We managed to blend Azure technology and OpenAI into a smooth and easy-to-use experience. Even though we ran into some problems along the way, our platform is now a trusted and effective tool for the Howard community.

What we learned

This project helped us see how AI can make a big difference in education. We got better at using Azure services, fine-tuning language models for our users, and learned a lot about designing a good experience for users.

What's next for Bison Connect

Looking ahead, Bison Connect aims to expand its knowledge base, integrate with more university systems, and offer personalized educational support. A major focus will be on increasing accessibility through the addition of Text-to-Speech (TTS), speech recognition, and image generation features. This will not only make the platform more user-friendly but also cater to a wider range of learning preferences and needs.

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