For my capstone, I built a wrist-worn heart rate monitor for my nonprofit rowing team, PCR. Rowing is an expensive sport, and my team works to make it accessible to kids who could not otherwise afford it. I wanted to contribute something that reflected that mentality.

The process started with a completely different idea. I originally planned to build a SpeedCoach, a device that tracks splits on the water, but after researching the cost and complexity, I had to pivot. I polled my teammates, landed on heart rate monitors, and went deep into research on how they work. Along the way, my anatomy teacher showed me data proving that heart rate monitors are less accurate for people with darker skin tones, which became a major focus of my research.

When talking to my teammates, they said reading a small number on a display while rowing was too difficult mid-stroke. So I designed the monitor around a circular ring of lights showing what percentage of your maximum heart rate you are at, with colors for each zone: blue for zone 1, green for zone 2, yellow for zone 3, orange for zone 4, and red for zone 5. At a glance, you know exactly where you are without breaking focus.

The biggest thing I learned is that building is a people process. Coaches, teammates, classmates, and even family solved problems I could not get alone. I also learned to trust making something over researching it before you start.

For my Senior Capstone I created a website called The Swing Blueprint, which is used to teach beginners the fundamental basics of the golf swing for no cost. The main purpose of making this website was to help beginners of the game get better without having to spend a ridiculous amount of money, so for The Swing Blueprint, users don’t have to give any money or get any subscription in order to use the website. The website divides the golf swing into seven different modules where there is an instructional video along with a mini quiz for each module to make it easier for anyone using the website to understand the information in the videos. I also designed the website to have a user tracking feature so that users can create an account to track their progress over time. After I got feedback from my peers I was told the website need to be more engaging for the users so I decided to implement a badges aspect to the website, so that when users completer a module they get a specific badge for that module to show they’ve mastered that skill. This website can be such as useful tool for anyone who is looking to get good at golf but doesn’t want to spend a ton of money on professional lessons because they can get the same information for free using The Swing Blueprint.

Final product: https://the-swing-blueprint-npos.vercel.app/

Annotated Bibliography: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LnuyTeZiOYyezrQfwYGB0mDY-FfVxwpXadIrk_D4PBA/edit?usp=sharing

For my Senior Capstone, I designed and built custom furniture for the Science Leadership Academy roof deck terrace. The centerpiece is a double chaise, a large, social lounge seat, paired with two benches that can be rearranged to fit any group size.

My capstone was split into three major phases: planning, fabrication, and assembly. At the beginning of this year I wanted to create an outdoor space, at SLA or not. I talked to an urban designer and realized all of the different constraints I would have to go through to make this possible and realized this would not be feasible for a one year project. These factors brought me to the idea of livening up an outdoor space that we already had: the roofdeck. With a clear goal, I moved to design. This started with little models and grew to making detailed cut lists for every piece. I had to figure out how to buy the least amount of wood and get all of the pieces that I needed. Then I worked on predrilling, rounding edges and sanding all of the cut wood. The final phase was assembly; bringing all of these materials to school and putting the final product together.

I learned a lot about woodworking; how to plan out a design and be safe while building. I also learned about collaboration and time management, how to keep myself on a deadline and work with my mentor to get the final product that I have in mind.

A lot of students choose not to pursue STEM careers due to the math involved with it. Intimidated by calculus and higher-level maths, many students do not choose to pursue these careers. This mini course was designed to bridge the gap between classroom math and industry math. I designed this mini course so that students could step into the roles of various careers, such as engineers, scientists, or architects.

My mini course ran from February 11th to April 8th, and over the course of these 8 weeks, students learned to do math and act in the roles of engineers, game analysts, forensic scientists, architects, among others. I researched and reflected on ways that I can make this mini-course more interactive and less hard to understand. Some activities included: Elephant toothpaste, paper airplanes, building towers, calculating game statistics, and more! Overall, these activities helped to bridge the gap between the math classes that they take right now and seeing the math truly in action. The kids also played a large role in deciding what careers they wanted to engage in. At the end of each session, I would ask what they would want to learn next week, and I would try to incorporate it somehow into next week’s lesson.

Overall, this process taught me that in the classroom collaboration is one of the most important skills to make it a place where people enjoy learning. I hope to continue expanding STEM education in the future.

Type 1 diabetes (T1D) is a chronic autoimmune condition that impacts the lives of billions of children everyday. I learned that all current devices are adult technology adapted for children, not designed child-first and that is what I most importantly needed to figure out how to change in my capstone idea without making it unrealistic for a child.

The “Duet”, which is to solve the “dual-device” problem where children currently have to wear one patch for a Continuous Glucose Monitor (CGM) and have to take needles in order to take their insulin and multiple pricks to check their glucose level. It’s a device that “thinks” for itself, using a sensor to read blood sugar and an internal pump to deliver insulin automatically without extra tubes.

The Duet doesn’t just manage blood sugar; it manages a child’s quality of life. It’s small, it’s silent, and most importantly, it’s invisible. It allows kids to just be kids.

The “Duet” is inspired by the current lifestyle of my little brother Kyan, diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes at the early age of five years old, questioning his childhood, asking my mother when will he be “normal” again and remembering the lifestyle he once lived that isn’t his lifestyle anymore. Living with a condition that others don’t have to experience, knowing my device doesn’t remove the permanent aspect of this condition, the Duet makes the lifestyle manageable and better to navigate, especially for children and that was my goal, to improve the lifestyle with the Duet for children.

Link to my final Product: https://canva.link/g1kjyiyo1b9fvg1