JKUAT Endeavour Open Day 18th September 2010

College Feed Group presenting their project

This year’s open day for JKUAT Endeavour was held on September 18, 2010 at JKUAT main campus. The day marked the end of the Web Application Development Course that was held in the month of June – July 2010. The event started with opening remarks from Dr. Waweru Mwangi, Director Institute of Computer Science and Information Technology – JKUAT. He thanked the organizers of the event, the students and the guest judges who spared their time to participate in the event. He put emphasis on the issue of support and continuity of projects after prototypes had been developed. He emphasized the importance of universities creating linkages with the industry.  Participants were encouraged with the fact that most web inventions were initiated by students in class. The web is supposed to be interactive, a concept that has now taken root in the social web.

Guest lectures were delivered by:
1.    Web 2.0 and social media – Alex Mwaura
2.    Do it different – Samuel Kamochu
3.    Freelancing and mobile application development – Solomon Kariri
4.    Web applications – Mark Mwongela
5.    Google maps – Jeremiah Kamau

Student groups presented their projects before a panel of judges composed of Mark Mwongela (Verviant), Samuel Kamochu (Safaricom), Alex Mwaura (Creative Edge) and Andrew Ketoyo (Creative Edge). Winners were announced at the end of the competition. The winning group was College Feed. The team presented a social media web application integrating Google maps to display event venues. The runners up were the Jazika group with a web application for sellers and buyers of second products. The second runners up were the Online Academy group with an application for helping students revise for examinations.

Students on study tour to Germany

Thirteeen students of the Department of Horticulture, JKUAT,  accompanied by one lecturer, are  currently on a two week study tour of Germany. The visit has been organised by the department of Horticulture of JKUAT, funded by DAAD and hosted by the Leibniz Universität Hannover. The objective of the programme is to expose students to cutting edge technologies in Horticulture and Science at large, and to provide a platform for social and cultural exchange with their German counterparts. Specific activities include visits to educational and research institutions, temperate fruit farms, landscape gardens, factories and a number of  cultural sites.