Chapter 5: Presentation Day
The classroom felt unusually crisp that morning.
Chairs had been neatly arranged into rows. A white screen was pulled down at the front of the room, with a projector humming faintly above. The air buzzed with a different kind of tension—the charged anticipation of students about to step into judgment.
Elias sat quietly near the back of Room 201, his laptop beside him, cool and ready. Around him, his classmates fidgeted nervously, straightening papers, checking their USB drives, whispering about what the panel might ask.
Then the door opened.
Professor Dumlao entered first, wearing a formal button-down and slacks, eyes alert. Gone was the casual professor from earlier in the week; this was the version that meant business.
Behind him followed two other faculty members from the IT department—Prof. Miranda and Prof. Basco, both seasoned educators and known for their sharp critique.
And then came the last figure: a tall woman in a navy blazer, hair pinned tightly into a bun, glasses perched at the bridge of her nose.
Whispers spread immediately.
"That's Ma'am Elcano," Emil muttered from two rows ahead. "The department head."
But they weren't the last to arrive.
Trailing just behind the panel were two sharply dressed individuals wearing navy lanyards emblazoned with the Metrobank Foundation insignia. One carried a leather folder, the other a tablet, both observing the room with calm professionalism.
Prof. Dumlao stepped forward and spoke into the mic. "These two representatives from Metrobank are here to supervise today's evaluations. As many of you know, our school is now part of the Metrobank Innovator Program—a partnership that supports promising students in technology and development."
A ripple of realization passed through the class. The challenge wasn't just academic anymore. It was public. Real. Professional.
"These guests," Dumlao continued, "will be reporting back to their foundation regarding your performance, as this is not just about grades anymore. It's about what you can create, how you think, and how you present yourself."
The students sat a little straighter. Laptops were nudged into better angles. The stakes had just risen.
Elias tilted his head slightly. So they were serious about this presentation.
He gestured faculty seated beside him. "These are your evaluators. They'll be looking at the functionality, structure, presentation, and depth of understanding. And yes, this will determine whether someone earns the exemption."
The tension snapped taut.
Dumlao continued, "You'll come up one by one, share your screen, present your system, explain your logic, and answer any questions. Keep it concise, but clear. We'll be here until the end of the day to accommodate all your presentations."
Before stepping aside, he added, "And one more important announcement."
All eyes turned toward him.
Ma'am Elcano, the department head, stood and addressed the class with a composed, authoritative tone.
"This isn't just a performance task. We've partnered with Metrobank Foundation for this quarter. The student who earns the highest evaluation today—not just in functionality, but in innovation and depth of understanding—will receive a one-year scholarship worth fifty thousand pesos, along with a twenty-five thousand peso allowance."
Gasps swept the room.
"Consider this your chance," she added, eyes scanning the class. "We're not just watching your systems. We're looking for potential."
She sat back down. The room was dead silent, the air now charged with a mix of panic, excitement, and rising ambition.
Dumlao nodded. "Let's begin."
The first student called was Lester. He walked to the front with a nervous smile and plugged in his USB.
His project was a simple Student Grade Calculator—built entirely in a C# console application. It asked for names, allowed manual grade input, and displayed averages in a tabular format.
"Good use of loops," noted Prof. Miranda.
"But you're manually resetting the arrays between each student?" Prof. Basco asked, eyebrows raised.
"Yes, sir," Lester said sheepishly. "Didn't know how to dynamically handle lists yet."
They moved on.
Next was Camacho. His system was a Simple Inventory Manager, also built with nested conditionals and switch-case logic. The evaluator nodded politely, though Ma'am Elcano only raised an eyebrow when the interface flickered with formatting issues.
Emil's turn followed. He had built a Mini Quiz System that randomly picked questions from a hardcoded array and awarded points based on correct answers. There was even a timer and basic text animation.
"You put some creativity into the UX," Dumlao said with a hint of approval.
Still, all the systems—despite the minor flourishes—lived within the confines of the console window. They were solid attempts, but visibly foundational.
Elias waited.
As the names dwindled, glances started drifting toward him. Whispers again.
"He's probably going last."
"Didn't he study web stuff last time?"
Then, at last, Dumlao called out, "Elias Angeles."
The room quieted.
Elias stood, calm and deliberate, and walked to the front of the room.
He connected his laptop and turned toward the panel.
"I built a Student Record Management System," he said clearly, projecting his voice. "It's a hybrid application—an ASP.NET MVC Web App integrated with a Windows Forms GPA calculator."
There was a brief pause. A few students blinked. Prof. Miranda tilted her head.
"Go ahead," Dumlao said, motioning to the screen.
Elias clicked Run, and the system compiled flawlessly—no warnings, no hiccups. The panel leaned forward slightly, eyes narrowing with interest as the browser launched.
The interface loaded in seconds. What they saw wasn't a classroom prototype—it looked like a professional-grade system.
A clean, responsive UI greeted them: a soft, gradient background behind a sharp top navigation bar that read:
Dashboard | Student Records | Add Entry | GPA Calculator | Reports
Each icon in the navbar had hover animations, and the colors shifted subtly—dark blue to light indigo. The layout was balanced: cards with student summaries on the left, and a pie chart reflecting course distributions on the right. A crisp Bootstrap theme, lightly customized with CSS and media queries, ensured perfect alignment even as the professors shifted screen sizes.
Elias cleared his throat, posture calm yet assertive.
"Good afternoon, Ma'am Elcano, Professors, and guests. Today, I'll be presenting a production-ready Student Information System built using ASP.NET MVC, with Entity Framework Core as ORM, hosted on Azure App Services, and deployed via Azure DevOps CI/CD pipeline. What you see is not a concept—it's operational and scalable."
A murmur rippled through the class. Most projects were still stuck in console loops.
Elias clicked on the Student Records tab. The grid appeared—sortable columns, pagination, and search functionality.
"All student data is stored in a SQLite database during local development for simplicity, but the system is configured via dependency injection to switch to Azure SQL by modifying a single appsettings.json key."
He right-clicked and opened the solution file, showing his Startup.cs.
"Here, I'm injecting the StudentDbContext using Fluent API. I avoided Data Annotations for full control. Let me explain the schema."
He opened his Student.cs model. Clean, concise.
public class Student
{
public int StudentId { get; set; }
public string FullName { get; set; }
public string Course { get; set; }
public int YearLevel { get; set; }
public ICollection
}
Then the DbContext:
protected override void OnModelCreating(ModelBuilder modelBuilder)
{
modelBuilder.Entity
{
entity.HasKey(e => e.StudentId);
entity.Property(e => e.FullName)
.IsRequired()
.HasMaxLength(100);
entity.Property(e => e.Course)
.HasMaxLength(50);
entity.HasMany(e => e.Grades)
.WithOne()
.HasForeignKey(g => g.StudentId);
});
modelBuilder.Entity
{
entity.HasKey(e => e.Id);
entity.Property(e => e.Subject).IsRequired();
entity.Property(e => e.Grade).HasPrecision(3, 2);
});
}
"By using Fluent API, I ensured strict schema validation. For example, full name length, grade precision, and enforced relational integrity between students and grades."
He switched back to the app and clicked Add Entry.
The form popped up: fields auto-aligned, real-time validation animations, error prompts in light red under invalid fields.
"Validation is handled both on client-side using jQuery and on the server using FluentValidation. For example, invalid course names or empty fields won't get through. Let's try one."
He entered a dummy student—Juan Dela Cruz, BSCS, 2nd year—and clicked Submit.
A loading animation appeared—clean SVG spinner. Then the dashboard refreshed automatically. No page reloads. No jank.
The panel stared at the seamless experience.
"This form submits via AJAX and returns a partial view. That way, we reduce server load and create a fluid UX. I applied progressive enhancement where older browsers still get fallback post-backs."
Then came the twist.
"Now, let's go beyond localhost."
He minimized the IDE and opened a new browser tab. The URL bar read:
https://taguig-student-app.azurewebsites.net
Live.
The panel gasped softly.
"This is the same system, deployed using Azure App Services under the Student Tier Plan. What you see here is real-time data mirrored from the Azure SQL database."
He opened the Azure DevOps portal.
"Every time I commit to the main branch in GitHub, this CI/CD pipeline is triggered."
He pulled up the pipeline YAML file and walked them through each stage.
Restore NuGet
Build the project
Run xUnit tests
Publish build artifacts
Deploy via Web Deploy to Azure App Service
"I also configured slot settings, error logging with Application Insights, and environment variables for secure key handling."
Prof. Miranda leaned in. "No manual FTP deployments?"
Elias shook his head. "Zero manual intervention, sir. The system enforces code quality gates before accepting any build."
He turned to the GPA Calculator.
"This tool lets you select a student, enter their subjects and grades, and auto-calculates GPA using the weighted average formula. It then stores that record, timestamped, linked to the student ID."
The form allowed bulk entry, autocomplete for subjects, and grade validation per range.
"This component was designed as a shared module. I can plug this GPA logic into other applications like enrollment or analytics dashboards."
He submitted a few grades. A graphical GPA trend chart appeared—a line graph showing improvement over terms.
He clicked on Reports.
"Finally, we generate PDF grade summaries using Razor Views rendered via Rotativa. It supports printable layouts with official headers and footers, suitable for transcript generation."
He downloaded a sample—headers aligned, academic year, QR code in the corner.
Then he clicked Settings, showing a form where the admin can change database connections, theme colors, and export/import backups.
Finally, he closed the browser.
"This isn't a school project. This is a foundation. Given more time, I could integrate Single Sign-On, role-based access, or even deploy this as a container to AKS."
The room was completely silent.
Even Ma'am Elcano seemed briefly stunned.
The Metrobank representative turned to her and whispered something. She nodded.
Prof. Basco, still processing, muttered:
"You used Fluent API, Azure, DevOps, Razor, EF Core, partials, AJAX… How long did this take you?"
Elias responded, evenly.
"Four days. I started the moment Prof. Dumlao announced the performance task."
More silence.
Then Ma'am Elcano spoke.
"You've built something real, Elias. Beyond our expectations. Beyond our curriculum."
Then Dumlao stood.
"We'll proceed with final deliberations later. But I think the entire room agrees—you've set the bar."
The panel slowly clapped—followed by hesitant claps from the back, then a rising ovation from classmates.
Elias stepped down—not boastful, just quietly assured.
He didn't just complete a task. He had built a system worthy of production.
And every evaluator in the room knew it.
As Elias returned to his seat, the silence hadn't quite recovered. Not yet. His classmates stared at him with a mix of disbelief and admiration—some still blinking as though they had just witnessed something far beyond a typical student project presentation.
Jayson leaned over.
"Bro… you just dropped a system with DevOps. Are you even real?"
Even the quieter ones—those who barely spoke in class—glanced at Elias with a new kind of attention. The kind reserved for people who didn't just follow the course… they broke through it.
At the panel's table, Prof. Miranda tapped on his tablet, his brows furrowed not in confusion, but in recalibration.
"You said four days?" he asked again, still trying to wrap his mind around the weight of it.
Elias nodded.
"Yes, sir. The first day was for architecture design and setting up Azure. Day two was core development and UI. Day three was testing and pipeline integration. Day four, refinement and production deployment."
The Metrobank representative in the front row—an older gentleman in a tailored charcoal-gray suit—whispered something to his colleague, a younger woman with a digital tablet on her lap.
They didn't clap with the students. They didn't need to. Their expressions said more.
Ma'am Elcano turned to the two of them.
"Any thoughts?"
The man adjusted his glasses and stood. His voice was calm but carried weight.
"I've been supervising tech accelerator programs for over a decade now," he began. "We've seen capstones, prototypes, even award-winning student apps. But rarely do we see a system presented by a junior student that ticks every pillar of modern application development—CI/CD, cloud-hosted, modular architecture, UX responsiveness, ORM integrity, and documentation."
He turned to Elias.
"You didn't just build an app, Mr. Angeles. You built a pipeline. A replicable structure that could support future developers and feature growth. That's rare."
Whispers spread again across the room.
Then the younger Metrobank representative stood up.
"Your project fits exactly what we look for in the Metrobank Innovator Program. Usually, we evaluate graduating students—but I'd like to formally recommend you for an exception, Elias."
Elias blinked. "Ma'am?"
"You'll receive an email in the next few days. We'd like to connect you to our internal tech incubator. If you're willing, we'd like you to pitch this project—or any future one—on a regional level. We support mentoring, seed grants, and potentially enterprise-level scale."
Lester whispered under his breath.
"He just got recruited. Live."
Even Emil looked stunned now, his earlier comments humbled.
Ma'am Elcano stood. The room immediately quieted again.
"Let me make one thing clear," she said, eyes sweeping the classroom. "This isn't just a benchmark—it's a disruption. The academic line between student-level and industry-level work is shifting, and Elias has just proven it."
She paused.
"To the rest of you—don't feel discouraged. Feel challenged. Because the future belongs to those who can learn fast, adapt faster, and build for real."
She looked at Elias.
"And Elias? We'll be discussing your exemption not only from this performance task, but possibly the entire semester."
That drew stunned reactions from across the class.
Elias, who had remained silent through the praises, simply nodded.
"Thank you, Ma'am."
And then—at last—the panel moved on to the next group.
A pair of nervous students shuffled forward, carrying USBs and printed documentation.
The classroom returned to the scheduled programming… but nothing was quite the same anymore.
Somewhere in the back, a student whispered:
"We just saw the future."
And in the front row, Elias sat—quiet, composed, but with the weight of a new chapter forming in his mind.