Abstract

The Golden Eagle Flight Plan is a mobile application that helps university students track their overall progress, discover research and internship opportunities, and plan their career development in one centralized platform. Currently, students must juggle multiple disconnected sources to find opportunities on campus: emails, social media, various websites, etc. This application solves that problem by bringing everything together: it automatically monitors goal progress and alerts students to what they need to complete, matches them with relevant research and internship opportunities based on their profile and interests, and strengthens connections with faculty advisors who can update resources and app content. 

Product Description

The Golden Eagle Flight Plan is built on a full-stack JavaScript architecture using React Native with Expo for the frontend and Node.js with Express for the backend. The frontend utilizes a component-based structure with screens for login, registration, profile management, and a tabbed dashboard (Home, Plan, Resources). The application implements role-based access control that will relect different interfaces depending on whether the user is a student or faculty member.

The backend is built on Express, connected to MongoDB Atlas for cloud-hosted database management. Data is structured using Mongoose schemas across three primary models: User.js for authentication credentials and role assignment, Resource.js for content storage and hashtag categorization, and Event.js for workshops and opportunity listings. API routes handle CRUD operations for resources, events, and user profiles, while JWT (JSON Web Token) authentication secures all data transmission and validates user sessions.  The architecture is designed for scalability to support multiple academic programs (currently focused on CS) and can be extended with planned AI recommendation features that will leverage the existing user profile and opportunity data structures.