Week 5 Learning Journal

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Part One: Support and Comment on Teammates' Goals

Erin Hurley – erinhurleycsumb.blogspot.com

Ryan Christian Perez – ryancsojourney.blogspot.com

Part Two: Possible Capstone Ideas

After watching multiple capstone project presentations and reviewing guidance from the faculty and video lectures, I brainstormed three project ideas I could pursue for my own capstone.

  1. AI-Powered Interview Coach
    A web-based platform that helps students prepare for technical and behavioral interviews using AI. It would simulate common interview questions, analyze responses for clarity, confidence, and accuracy, and provide personalized feedback. This would combine front-end development, AI integration, and soft skill development—a good fit with my interests.

  2. Smart Campus Navigation App
    A mobile-friendly app designed to help new students find classrooms, labs, and event locations across campus. It could include features like QR code check-ins, class reminders, and even accessible route suggestions. This is a practical solution that I believe many students would find helpful, especially during the first semester.

  3. Volunteer Impact Tracker for Schools and Nonprofits
    A cloud-based application for tracking student or community volunteer hours. It would include dashboards for students and coordinators, automated reporting, and tools for verifying and approving hours. This project would involve full-stack development and could integrate calendar/event tools.

These ideas are inspired by both personal interests and the type of real-world problems I saw other students successfully address in their own projects, such as data visualization, public service apps, and educational tools.

Part Three: Weekly Reflection

This week was a turning point in how I view the capstone experience and my future in tech. Watching the student presentations gave me a deeper appreciation for what’s possible when you combine creativity, discipline, and technical skills. Projects like Traffic Tracer, PetRex, and Easy Dashboard showed how students tackled real-world problems they cared about and built practical solutions from scratch. I was especially impressed by the game development and AI-focused projects, which revealed just how wide the possibilities are.

Through this module, I also gained clarity on what a stakeholder analysis looks like in an ethics argument. The breakdown of different types of claims- fact, value, policy, definition, and cause, helped me understand how to structure arguments in a more professional and objective way. I found the explanation of stakeholder values and positions especially useful for framing perspectives in a meaningful way, and I’m looking forward to using this framework in my ethics essay.

Finally, this week got me thinking seriously about internships and graduate school. I’m starting to explore internship options for Summer 2026, especially those focused on software development or AI applications. I’m also considering applying to graduate programs in the future, but I’d like to first get some hands-on industry experience. Having a clear capstone direction now helps me feel more motivated to approach my remaining classes with a sense of purpose.

Overall, this week gave me new tools, new ideas, and a renewed sense of motivation to continue growing as a developer.

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