So... I hacked for 24 hours nonstop yesterday and I got a bunch of ideas for my capstone. Win-win, am I right?
I competed at a hackathon called Technica at UMD College Park- an all girl hackathon. It was one of the most amazing events I have ever been to. Never in my life have I ever seen a room of girls so eager to learn and take on new challenges. Everyone was desperately working up until the 24 hour mark, determined to finish their projects for judging. Now you're probably wondering what a hackathon even is? No, not that type of hacking. A hackathon is when programmers meet to do collaboratively program to innovate. And yes, it is the best thing ever. I realized that to make my capstone more fun, I should make it more of a collaborative experience rather than just a simple workshop where I teach and the girls listen. Technica was fun because we learned from mentors as well as from each other. I will definitely take that into consideration as I develop my final project! If you're wondering what I did at the hackathon, my app did get interviewed by a tech magazine: catch my interview here.
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First of all, welcome! I hope you decide to stick around and explore, hopefully my capstone will ignite your own passions too.
In my high school, all seniors are given the opportunity to execute something called a "capstone project". The capstone "is designed to encourage students to think critically, solve challenging problems, and develop skills such as oral communication, public speaking, research skills, media literacy, teamwork, planning, self-sufficiency, and goal setting—i.e., skills that will help prepare them for college, modern careers, and adult life. In most cases, the projects are also interdisciplinary, in the sense that they require students to apply skills or investigate issues across many different subject areas or domains of knowledge." So, what's my passion? This used to be a hard question, but I know that my passion lies in encouraging girls to code, teaching girls how to code, etc. This is why I want to intertwine my senior capstone project with my She++ #include fellowship (more details at: sheplusplus.org/include/). The #include fellowship works to empower underrepresented groups in technology by dismantling negative stereotypes surrounding technical careers. Everything is pretty much up in the air right now, but I'll check back in when my idea comes together. |
TanyaJust a techie teen spreading around the coding superpower. Archives
June 2017
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