MannaBook: Connecting Manna Christian Fellowship

Abstract

Manna is an evangelical, inter-denominational Christian Fellowship in Princeton University that has approximately 70 students. Since there are many students involved in the organization, there is a great need for a formal and centralized platform to host information outside of sending weekly emails and Group Me reminders. This paper describes the design, implementation, and evaluation of MannaBook, a website created to house general information about Manna-from its leadership to events-and a way to connect its members to each other through adding a database of those involved in the fellowship. In this application, users can create a profile, upload a photo and any file of their choice, and share bios that can then be read by others. In addition, users will be able to listen to and filter through recorded messages from Manna’s Large Group, a weekly gathering. As an extension of the website, an experimental study was conducted to find the best semantic text matching algorithm to suggest connections between the messages and bible passages from the gospel books. When fully implemented, this feature would aim to enhance a user's learning and engagement when listening to a recorded message. Through user evaluation, I demonstrate that MannaBook successfully centralizes Manna's information, unifies its members, and offers a new way to engage in recorded messages with bible readings.