Can Undergraduate Students Build an Internal Development Platform?

Explore a fascinating educational experiment through this 12-minute conference talk where Adam Roe, faculty member at CODE University of Applied Sciences, examines whether advanced undergraduate students can successfully build an internal development platform using open-source tools. Discover how students navigated the complexities of infrastructure, developer experience, and system design without definitive technical guides, creating a practical alternative to commercial hosting solutions for first-year students' web projects. Learn about the unexpected challenges encountered, key factors that contributed to project success, and how this hands-on experience shaped students' understanding of platform engineering as both an academic discipline and potential career path. Gain insights into innovative approaches for teaching platform engineering concepts at the undergraduate level and understand the unique considerations involved in applying these principles within an academic environment.