UMass students partner with ISO-NE experts on application development project   

University of Massachusetts Amherst students worked with market experts at ISO New England this past fall on a new application that will improve efficiencies in the internal administration of the Forward Capacity Market. Completed in December 2023, it marked the culmination of a semester-long project that was the fourth of its kind in a continuing partnership between the ISO and UMass.

Chris Lemay, supervisor of Markets and Financial Application Development, oversaw the project, and Angela Gaspar, Talent Acquisition and University Relations specialist, provided support to Lemay and the students. The project focused on creating a standalone document management app to make it easier for ISO staff to view and download files uploaded by market participants using the Forward Capacity Tracking System application.

The original application organized documents based on an individual project or proposal, but document reviewers wanted the ability to view and download groups of these documents based on their own criteria. The students met the challenge successfully, producing enhancements that significantly improved the application’s filtering capabilities.

“The students bring a lot of curiosity and creativity to their work,” Lemay said. “It’s great to be able to provide this kind of meaningful, hands-on learning opportunity for the next generation of application developers.”

Plans to partner with another group of UMass students are in the works.  

“For students, it’s a chance to put their programming skills to the test with a corporate sponsor, working on real projects with real impact,” Gaspar said. “For the ISO, it’s an opportunity to share our mission and inspire students to consider an internship or career with us. This partnership is a win-win for UMass and ISO New England.”