by Lexey Burns

Laurentian student Malek Abou-Rabia is working on a special project he hopes will push students to discover more about their campus.   

This project is an app programmed similarly to “Pokemon Go,” where you can walk around campus, but instead of trying to catch Pikachu, you are able to scan different pieces of artwork found on Laurentian’s campus and have a video play which explains the history of the piece.

On Thursday February 26th, 2020 Malek and his team held a presentation in the Jim Fielding building where they showed a prototype of the project.  

“Laurentian has a five year strategic goal […] where they have twenty to twenty-five different things of what they want to see by 2023. They’re called outcomes,” Malek said.  

“Outcome number four by definition is ‘we will be a hub for arts and culture increasing awareness to the artistic and cultural contributions of Indigenous, Franco-Ontarian, and other Northern artists, basically making Laurentian into a hub for arts and culture.’” 

Back in September, an opportunity was opened to Malek to be the lead of the student led project.  

To fulfil outcome number four, Malek along with his team (pictured above) Aayushi Pandey, Nirav Pandey, Cameron Perdue, Jennifer Ross, Malek Abou-Rabia and (not pictured) Hetang Patel have been volunteering their time and skill to bring this project from an idea to reality.  

Despite not currently having any funding, the team continues to break barriers in the technological world. 

If this project interests you and you wish to be more involved in Laurentian’s community, there are three different teams – the Tech Team, the Content Team, and the Presentation Team – looking for extra volunteers to help finish perfecting the app for it’s launch during Frosh Week.