The Gist
The Ateneo Enlistment Helper is a web app for planning class schedules before enlistment. Students can search courses, filter sections, and build a visual timetable without living inside a spreadsheet.
Where It Came From
Every semester, it was the same headache. The official university website for classes was old and a total pain to navigate. Finding classes that were open and fit your schedule felt like a huge chore.
Like everyone else, my solution was to copy-paste everything into a messy Google Sheet. I’d spend hours trying to piece together a schedule that worked, hoping I didn’t make any mistakes. I got tired of it and figured, why not just build something better?
The Technical Hurdle: Getting the Data
The biggest challenge was actually getting the course data. The university’s system was locked down, with no official way to access the class list.
So, I built a web scraper. I wrote a script to browse the portal like a student would, grabbing all the important info like schedules, professors, and open slots. The problem was, this data changed constantly as people signed up for classes.
To keep the Helper updated, I set up a GitHub Actions job that re-ran the scraper every few hours. The tool only worked if students could trust the data.
The Result: A Tool Students Liked
Once I had the data figured out, I built a simple front-end with the features I always wanted: a good search, useful filters, and a visual schedule builder.
I shared it with a few friends, not expecting much. Word got around, and the helper ended up helping 500+ students plan schedules across 3,000+ enlistment-week visits.
That was the first time one of my campus tools clearly moved beyond my own friend group. People were using it instead of spreadsheets because it made the stressful part of enlistment easier to reason about.
