Alison Holland, EdD | Web Developer

Photo by Natalie Jennings

Hi, I’m Alison.

I'm a user interface (UI) developer with a background that spans education, public service, and marketing.

Before moving into development, I spent nearly a decade as a digital learning designer at University of Minnesota Extension, where I partnered with educators to create engaging, accessible learning experiences. I also recently served my community as a County Commissioner.

Today, at the University of Minnesota Foundation, I focus on improving the accessibility and usability of our digital tools—reflecting the values I’ve carried throughout my career: accessibility, collaboration, and solving real-world problems. My path hasn’t been linear—and that’s a strength. Working across disciplines has taught me how much different fields can learn from one another, and I bring that systems-thinking mindset to every challenge I take on.

Skills

Developer skills

Front-end technologies, including stateful, responsive, mobile-first design, and accessibility practices (HTML5, CSS3, JavaScript, Media Queries, Content Management Systems)
Back-end development, including Object-Oriented Programming (Python) and database integration (SQL, Jinja, PHP)
Software testing, including browser (Ghost Inspector, Marker.io, Happo) and accessibility testing (WAVE, Pope Tech, Google Lighthouse, keyboard-only navigation, VoiceOver)
Version control (Git, GitHub)
Web frameworks (React, Flask)
API development and integration, including CRUD operations (REST, RESTful)

Complementary skills

Learning design and learning management systems (Canvas, Moodle), including knowledge of UI/UX design
Quantitative and qualitative research, including survey design (Qualtrics), usability testing, focus groups, and data analysis and visualization
Plain language writing, break downing complex topics and turning jargon into plain language
Strategic and systems thinking, aligning technical work and daily tasks with business goals and cross-team collaboration
Standard office and design software (Microsoft Office, Google Suite, Canva, Slack, Figma)

Projects

Work products

Improved accessibility in legacy code

Skills

Conducting both automated and manual accessibility testing
Application of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript skills with accessible practices
Updating and adapting legacy code

Tools

PopeTech
WAVE
Ghost Inspector
Chrome DevTools (including Lighthouse)
Visual Studio Code
Git/GitHub

preview of the University of Minnesota's online giving tool

Description

I led the accessibility improvements for the University of Minnesota's online giving tool, boosting the automated Pope Tech score from 6.7 to a perfect 10. This was accomplished by modernizing the legacy UI to comply with WCAG standards. I conducted accessibility testing, organized issues, and implemented key enhancements, including refined keyboard navigation, ARIA implementations, and improved screen-reader support.

Work is ongoing to make this site as accessible as possible.

Developed scalable custom appeal cart pages

Skills

Development and utilization of Elasticsearch API
Application of HTML, CSS, and JavaScript skills with accessible practices
Working within a legacy codebase, leveraging existing jQuery design patterns

Tools

Elasticsearch
Figma
Chrome DevTools
Visual Studio Code
Git/GitHub

preview of the University of Minnesota's Urolith Center custom cart page

Description

I revamped custom appeal cart pages that were originally hard-coded in a beta version prior to my arrival at the organization. This involved integrating them with an Elasticsearch-backed API that I developed. I am also collaborating to implement a Quality Assurance (QA) workflow focused on enhancing scalability.

As a result, this project scaled to 10+ appeals within two weeks of rollout, representing a 150% increase from the 4-appeal beta phase that preceded the API launch.

Learning project

Co-created AI prompt builder powered by React

Skills

Utilization of HTML, CSS, and React.js
Implementation of Google Gemini API
Collaborative development on a remote team using agile practices, including both solo and pair programming
Application of accessible design practices

Tools

React + Vite
Google Gemini API
Netlify
Figma
Chrome DevTools
GitHub Repository and Projects

Description

This app was created through a Chingu tier 1 voyage. As a team, we built a web application, PromptAlchemy, which lets its users become more effective at building AI prompts.

It follows a structured methodology called a Pentagram to help the user build good prompts, test them, and learn to improve on them along the way.

I led the implementation of accessibility best practices and applied design styles to ensure an intuitive and inclusive user experience.