In November 2024, undergraduate students (2nd year computer science and engineer major) Allen Wolf and (4th year computer science major) Liam Stamper showcased their technical innovation at Swan Hacks, securing second place with their project, Quizly. Wolf drew inspiration for the idea from his experience with different live platforms throughout K-12. Since this year’s hackathon centered around education, they aimed to address features that similar platforms lacked—making quizzes both fair and educational.

Beyond their original goal of accessibility and fairness, the team plans to enhance quiz generation for ease of use and to provide better analytics for both teachers and students, allowing them to dig deeper into learning insights. Their mission is to create a platform that makes studying and learning outside of the class more streamlined and effective.

To tackle the disparity in student knowledge, they introduced dynamic difficulty in competitive game mode, ensuring that students, regardless of their proficiency level, faced questions tailored to their abilities, creating a more balanced and educational experience. They also added AI guidance for students who answered questions incorrectly. This feature offered immediate feedback, helping students learn from their mistakes while earning partial credit—a design focused on promoting learning over penalization.

The team’s responsibilities were divided as follows:

• Wolf developed the API endpoints, which handled data communication between the front end and back end, managed containerized services for scalability, and handled databases with reverse proxies to ensure secure data access.
• Stamper focused on front-end components, designing the user interface, and processing API responses to ensure a seamless user experience.

One of the most challenging aspects of the hackathon was the time constraint. Wolf and Stamper had only 24 hours to develop their project from scratch, designing, testing, and deploying an entire web service. They both decided to work through the night to ensure they could finish on time.

Despite not having prior experience with WebSockets, Wolf's background in socket programming helped him quickly grasp the concept. However, managing WebSocket data scope and ensuring real-time updates with the Redis datastore led to complex bugs that were difficult to diagnose. Wolf had to thoroughly debug and carefully coordinate the WebSocket connections with the datastore to ensure the data remained accurate and the WebSocket logic consistent. Thankfully, his familiarity with REST APIs using Flask and FastAPI helped smooth the experience.

Even with the challenges they faced, their collaboration proved successful thanks to strong communication and a focus on early testing, which ensured that key functionality was in place. By staying committed to their vision and working together, they not only completed the project on time but also delivered a well-rounded platform that pushed the boundaries of educational technology.

What was your favorite part about Swan Hacks this year?

Wolf: My favorite part about hackathons is getting to meet many incredibly talented people and see all of the creative and innovative projects that the teams bring to life.

Stamper: I really like the energy in the room. Everyone trying to build as fast as they can is just a fun environment to be in.

How did participating in this hackathon help you grow as a developer or as a team?

Wolf: Participating in this hackathon helped me grow as a developer by pushing me to work under pressure and meet tight deadlines. It also taught me how to quickly adapt to unfamiliar technologies, which has improved my ability to learn and problem-solve on the fly. 

Stamper: I felt really good about some of the front-end logic I designed along the way. There was a lot of time during the hackathon where I was just reading and thinking about how I could pull off a piece of the project that I hadn't ever done before. It was also just a great experience to work with Allen and has inspired us to keep working on this project.

What advice would you offer to someone who is considering participating in a hackathon for the first time?

Wolf: My advice would be to just go for it. I felt anxious in my abilities during my first hackathon, but it turned out to be an amazing opportunity to learn new things, challenge myself, and build something. Even just giving it a try can teach you a lot.

Stamper: I would tell them to go for it. Do some research and brainstorm your project. It's a super fun experience.