The end of the semester always brings lots of competing work and priorities to juggle. I think we’re all looking forward to a much deserved break (a short one for those of us taking a summer course), but we’re also sad to come to the end of the road for this precious project we’ve been building for months now. Our expectations for the number of submissions we actually received and the features we were able to create on the site were all blown away. It’s especially amazing considering none of us ever met up in person to collaborate.

For our last group update, I encouraged the team to submit their current thoughts on where we are:

Phil: “Now that our MVP (minimum viable product) has been delivered and our project has more or less reached GETGO (good enough to go), we are attempting to leverage our technology platform to make further enhancements.  This effort, which includes changes to the user experience of the website as well as to the underlying contribution processing workflow, is testing the limits of our initial technologies.  Encountering these issues puts us in a good place for identifying the objectives of the project’s next iteration.”

GETGO really stands out here as a theme for us. We had so many ambitious plans that changed over time, specifically our scope of student outreach. But it was all for the best as we were able to maintain control, instill care for these students, and not feel overwhelmed with our workload. It’s hard to punt features to the next phase, but we’ve come to a good point where we’re happy with what we’ve put together and feel confident about sharing it out in its current state.

Karyn: “Seeing all that has been expressed in the student work submitted to this point has reaffirmed the original motivation for this project while also sobering me to the reality of what we may see in the work moving forward. Care – in different forms – should be infused in every aspect of the project. As such, questions of scale remain in play for the future, but we are well-situated to see the project into its next stages as a direct result of the individual and collective contributions from our team. As a group, we have built something better than what any one of us could have and that brings a great deal of meaning in and of itself.”

So well put. In the theme of care for these students, we can’t just be good enough. We learned how important it is to have this be top of mind in everything we do. While we were focusing on putting together the end product, these students are generously taking time out of their pandemic-affected lives to create expressive works for us. It’s an experience of digging up memories that some might’ve found stressful and traumatic. During outreach, we found ourselves questioning in group syncs, “Are we asking too much from them? How do we navigate this with utmost respect?” Thankfully we stumbled across these important questions and worked to create solutions. It’s not only made Corona Chronicles better, but it’s also made us better as digital humanists.