For my capstone, a friend and I worked together to build a series of devices we called nodes that would sync together in a mesh system that would allow people to communicate with each other without the use of cellular service, mainly focused on people who enjoy the wilderness, where service may be spotty depending on location. To do this, we used the basic software of an open-source project, mixed with added elements like a GPS antenna and our own cases to store everything in.

This capstone taught me a lot about building a product and the engineering process for perfecting one. While I’m not sure I want to pursue a career where I have to invent new things, this experience building my own invention will help me find new creative ways to solve problems. This project also taught me how to store and analyze different data points to better understand how the nodes were working and what we could do to improve reliability.

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.

My capstone is RocketFest, a student-run Film and Photo Festival for public high school students of the Philadelphia School District. It’s taken a ton of work to get RocketFest to the point where it is now. Starting with brainstorming, from notes apps to google docs we spent hours thinking of ideas and thinking of how to achieve them. Then came outreach, emailing venues, schools, individual artists, potential volunteers, and professionals. We even got a booth at a CTE event. Between Braskem and other funding resources we spent a lot of time perfecting and practicing our pitches to try to get as much funding as possible to make RocketFest 2026 special. This meant creating slideshow presentations, and writing speeches. A film festival can’t happen without getting the word out there, so I spent a lot of time making graphics and posters. Our work was rounded out with logistical tasks; creating the submission form, organizing volunteers, planning day-of logistics, spending our funding money, and nailing down a venue. RocketFest has been a great learning process for me, and I plan on keeping a lot of the lessons I learned this year in mind during my coming years. The biggest lesson being that you can never be too ahead. At the start of the year we were so ahead of the curve, but as the year went on we began to slowly fall more and more down because of the “we’re ahead” mentality. So going forward I know not to get too cocky.