The idea for my capstone is to connect with as many communities as I can and share as much love as I can. I would like to start practicing some networking skills before I go to college. As the product of my capstone, I decided to make appreciation cards and send them to various organizations. One of my favorite hobbies is to scrapbook and journal. This is a perfect mixture of a passion project and for me to improve on my networking skills. I learned to create opportunities for myself and problem solve when things do not go as planned. I also learned to appreciate the little things more.

This is one of the workshops we did during our club. We made affirmation posters for this workshop. There were many other workshops such as making cards for disabled kids, and thanksgiving card fundraiser.

This is one of our club members making a card for disabled kid. They were sent to various organizations such as Cards for Hospitalized Kids and The Confetti Foundation.

This is a close up example of one of the cards. This was made by one of the club founders. Many stickers were used to brighten up the cards and bring personality to the paper.

My goal for my capstone was to invest in other people’s lives in a way that related to my future. I assistant coached a neighborhood recreation center’s first softball team and then created a lesson plan focused on building teamwork. This lesson plan was based on my observations on improvements that could be made during their practices and games. My family has been part of this recreation center for many years so I have a passion for working with and helping the kids who are participating on its teams. I have watched sports my entire life and have also had the opportunity to be on multiple different teams through my athletic career. Throughout both of these experiences, I have noticed and acknowledged how important teamwork can be in achieving wins and a healthy team environment.

For my capstone, I researched the history of printmaking and its role in social movements. I then designed, carved, and printed my own linocut prints about the issues and movements I care about. I will be distributing copies of my prints, to friends and family, as well as around my neighborhood. I chose this project because I have a passion for printmaking, as well as social justice, and I was interested in seeing how they go hand in hand, in the past and present. I also wanted to learn more about printmaking technique, and be able to work on my printmaking skills in a fulfilling way. I’m really proud of my final prints, and I plan on continuing to make more prints and collaborate with other artists and activists in Philadelphia to make art for change.

For my Senior Capstone I decided to create an informative Tik Tok page dedicated to teaching teens about the importance of having hobbies. The content on the page ranged from tutorials on different hobbies, examples of my experience participating in those hobbies, and how to make time for hobbies during school life. I chose this project after reflecting on my experiences during my junior year of school, and how hobbies helped get me out of a bad rut. During my junior year I struggled with finding the motivation to keep up with my responsibilities, and I found that after taking the time to participate in activities that made me happy I managed to pick myself back up and apply this new passion to my responsibilities. I felt that if I had had someone talk to me about finding a hobby that brought me joy earlier on in my high school career I would’ve had an easier time during my junior year, so I wanted to pass my knowledge along to anyone it might help.

For my capstone project I designed and taught an eight week long mini course in which I taught freshmen how to crochet. I chose to do this for my capstone because crocheting is a skill that I have found to be very valuable throughout my life. I think it is a good group or solo activity that really stimulates your brain, but can also be calming. There is also a lot of research that says crocheting is good for your brain and can slow aging. Plus it is very cool to see something you want and be able to just make it. For all these reasons I thought that crocheting was a really valuable thing to know, and so I wanted to pass this skill on.

I have worked with Ana Blumberg over the past year to create a sustainable and efficient Student Government Club at SLA. We were very ambitious at the beginning, planning out elections and the rules of the student government. We soon realized that we needed to get a group of interested students together to help us. And that was harder than we expected. After lots of trial and error, we ended up with a great group of about 30 interested and willing students to participate in the club. Knowing there wasn’t much time left in the year, we didn’t have time to hold these elections, we decided to do a fundraiser instead. And this way we would have starting funding for the club to continue next year and hopefully do even more amazing things.

Annotated Bibliography https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cBf6lO42IgF487fNAUZTe3p1AomTz3jA5BOEqQnC2Wk/edit?usp=sharing

For my capstone, I created a new database to be used by SLA students to help them with questions about colleges and majors they may be interested in. Through my database, they will be able to search for SLA alumni that match their interests and who have agreed to be contacted to answer questions. I used surveys and lots of outreach, and because of this, I was able to compile a list of alumni who are on standby for when an SLA student has a question for them about the college process or specific colleges. The result is a new resource for the college office that will be updated every year. After completing this capstone I learned that the SLA community is willing to help when called upon to help with the stressful college application process. I have also now gathered interesting information about what our SLA alumni do after graduation.

For this capstone, I worked on creating a stop motion animation short film. For the process I created an outline detailing the different scenes and interactions I wanted to have with each character. I wanted to create a super hero film because I always was interested in that and in stop motion. For the film I decided on using Spider-man, as he exemplifies what a true hero is and inspires me. After the outline I wrote a script in actual screenwriting format, and had it peer reviewed by several individuals. After that, I enlisted the help of my classmates to voice several different characters in my movie. Then I created all the sets and filmed each scene. The whole process took me about two months or so and was extremely difficult. But I feel as though I learned how to truly explore all my creative interests and how to be dedicated to the work I put out. Link for video down below:

As my capstone project, I decided to teach kids the essentials of financial literacy. This subject is not taught to every student. Understanding your finances is important, particularly as you age and gain independence. Thus, I choose to conduct a mini-course. As a result, I strengthened my students’ knowledge and enhanced my communication skills. No courses, workshops, or after-school programs were provided to teach students financial literacy throughout my time in the Philadelphia School District. However, I was lucky enough to have parents who helped me understand financial literacy, answered my questions, and explained debt, student loans, student loan repayment, credit card vs. debit card, savings account vs. checking account, and credit.

I chose a senior project topic that I knew would engage and be enjoyable for the students. There is a large number of students at SLA who play soccer, but there isn’t a space where they can play when in the winter. So to see if they would be interested in having a futsal league or after-school club, I hosted a futsal event. Students from different grades and with mixed skill levels attended this event to play. After the event, I interviewed some of them, to ask if they would like to see more of these events in the future, as well as to know why they thought it would be a great idea to have a futsal team and give the SLA gym more uses then just normal indoor sports. They all seemed to have a positive attitude towards this idea and wanted to make it a club. I chose this project because I was part of the soccer team during my senior year, and noticed many of the students with amazing skills, as well as those starting. After the season came winter, many didn’t know or had access to indoor facilities to play, and practice. So I wanted to give them a place where they could practice, Futsal is a great version of soccer that allows players to improve their skills according to the environment that they are playing in. SLA would be doing a lot of kids a favor by allowing them to utilize the gym to improve their soccer skills, we have a lot of great soccer players.