The thought of putting my own creativity that I use on projects outside of school was intriguing. The idea I committed to for my capstone project was a ‘Memories Chest’. The basic design was a chest that would be used to store memorable things, and it was a gift for my mom. It revolved around the engineering shop, and the tool my project was made possible by was the laser printer, which I was also really excited to use. At first, I thought about hand making the chest, but with research, I had to keep in consideration time and how difficult it would be. After laser cutting, making the chest was like a puzzle. It was interesting and fun to be handy and figure out the best way to put it together. I did accomplish getting the design I wanted at the end of the process, and it was like a clean canvas to work on further.

Annotated Bibliography: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Xgz-K1R79SHOlu12_50bmr4iHrlYH8-NCpvQuMNkGH0/edit?usp=sharing

The Road by Cormac McCarthy can be imagined and interpreted in many different ways. The element I chose to follow was the shelters the man and the boy stayed in. They must constantly move places, going further South and avoiding danger along the way. Most of the time, they slept in the woods with a fire that just barely lit for warmth, and ate what the man could salvage. There were many instances when the man went out looking for shelters with the boy, but they had to be careful not to be seen. One of the first places they found was a run down and wrecked gas station; “He went through the drawers but there was nothing there that he could use.” (6)

On the right side of the map, it shows the first places the man and the boy had been, each place the man looked carefully for food and resources for the both of them. It was difficult considering everything had been either destroyed or ransacked. Continuing forward through the woods and run-down houses, the man found a hatch. “Huddled against the back wall were naked people, male and female, all trying to hide, shielding their faces with their hands.” (110)

This was not the first or the last time they had encountered other people. People in either the same or worse situation than the man and the boy were a threat. They were starved, cold, and anything could become a resource. They had to stay protected, but throughout the novel McCarthy shows many examples of the man taking risks that could be life threatening. Going down the hatch could have easily been a trap, a dead end, and anything could have happened. It seems that the man took the risk because there was a chance of warmth, a chance for food; safety for the boy. The second time they came upon a hatch, the boy was hesitant; but the man was going to take the chance. Anything they find could have been useful and allowed them to continue pushing forward. “Crate upon crate of canned goods. Tomatoes, peaches, beans, apricots.” (135) Taking the risk and seeing what was down the second hatch proved to be helpful for them. In their tough situation, it was crucial to take the chances the man did for safety and survival. It was not only for himself, but for the boy he was determined to protect.

In The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood, there is a theme that pregnancy holds great significance throughout the story. The scene above is describing the moment when the main character Offred and another handmaid Ofglen went to a store named Milk and Honey with coupons for certain items. They encounter Ofwarren, also known as Janine; her real name. Both Offred and Ofwarren are outlined in red, to highlight whose point of view the readers are looking through, and the main focus. Atwood states, “As we wait in our double line, the door opens and two more women come in, both in red dresses and white wings of the Handmaids. One is vastly pregnant; her belly, under her loose garment, swells triumphantly. There is a shifting in the room, a murmur, an escape of breath; despite ourselves we turn our heads, blatantly, to see better; our fingers itch to touch her. She’s a magic presence to us, an object of envy and desire, we covet her.” (p. 26)

This quote strongly explains the importance and significance of pregnancy. The general thought the women were having as they waited in line is expressed by the thought bubble above their head. It was an uncommon thing for pregnant women to leave the house to go shopping. These duties are handed off to others when the handmaids get pregnant. The hands reaching out towards the pregnant belly represented certain key phrases such as ‘our fingers itch to touch her’ and ‘an object of envy and desire’. When reading about pregnancy the first time, the women seemed to have yearned for it. This is very important in the story because pregnancy is a representation for survival. In an interaction between the doctor and Offred, readers can begin to understand how serious it is. Atwood writes, “There are only women who are fruitful and women who are barren, that’s the law. ‘Lots of women do it,’ he goes on. ‘You want a baby, don’t you?’ ‘Yes,’ I say. It’s true, and I don’t ask why, because I know. Give me children, or else I die.” (p.61)

Throughout the reading it is clear that the majority of women in Gilead are seen as objects. In order to survive, to be ‘useful’, they must be able to produce a healthy child in this corrupted system. It is important to include that the women in Gilead have adjusted to an entirely new lifestyle, norm, and purpose in life after society changed. The freedom of choice has been eradicated in Gilead, and the community is seemingly based on fertility. Women have been portrayed like objects and reproduction machines. In the Milk and Honey store, Offred along with the other women around her, couldn’t keep their attention off of Janine. The bubble is a collective thought between them, and I wanted to express that heavily in the art piece. It became a common vision they shared. The leaves by the closing door they came through represents a recent entry into the store when everyone’s focus shifted to Janine. As the readers learn more about the system throughout the story, the true value of becoming pregnant is revealed.

In my previous slate post, I described my issues and concerns for public health. I spoke about my interest in travelling, wanting to see people, and I urged people to continue wearing their masks. Since that post, I have conducted more research, finding fundraisers that will help with the production of masks/distributing masks to the homeless. On Thursday (5/20/21) during my advisory period, I gave a presentation on the issue I wanted to address. In the presentation, I included a link to a GoFundMe, which will help to provide more masks to homeless individuals. I decided to do this because ever since quarantine began, we haven’t been able to go many places. There are a few things that inspired me, making me passionate about public health, and those are: helping others and travelling. During my research, I learned how many people are having a difficult time during this pandemic. I’ve learned how many different things have been affected by it, such as overcrowding in prisons and mask distribution for homeless people. Although I could not act on the bigger issues like overcrowding in prisons, I could at least speak out about something we’ve all been affected by: masks.

To take action, to be an agent of change, I decided to present to my advisory class. My presentation was 6 slides, including links to GoFundMe’s & other informational articles.

This is a screenshot of my screen-share during my advisory presentation.

Overall, I enjoyed creating and taking action for this project. I haven’t experienced making an actual change before in projects like these. It was very interesting to make a whole presentation and promote my ideas. Hopefully my presentation will have taken an effect and persuaded people to continue wearing their masks and staying safe. Thankfully, a vaccine has been created and maybe people both teenagers and adults, can get the vaccine. This will also help keep public health in check! Something I could have done better for this project is improving my slideshow presentation. I think I could have added a lot more information on the matter. I had lots of links to articles, and I think I should have added more information from them.

My initial ideas for this project were to create posters to hang up around a park I have gone to since I was younger or to create and donate to fundraisers to help mask production. I have a few designs that I created for the posters, because at first I was committing to that idea. If I were to do this project again, I would test that idea and see if posters would have had more of an effect than a presentation!

Initial design ideas for posters.

Something I’ve learned about myself is that I really do want to help others, and I feel much stronger about this idea than I thought I did. Something I’ve learned about other people is how many people are willing to create organizations and donate If anyone would like to help make this change, you can create your own fundraiser at https://www.gofundme.com/c/blog/mask-for-coronavirus, or donate to Carpenter’s Place, an organization working to create and distribute more masks.

Here is my annotated bibliography.

Are you someone who wants to travel, or someone who just wants to see their friends again? If so, are you still wearing a mask and following social distancing guidelines? There are many places where COVID cases are reaching high peaks, and people’s health is being greatly affected. Learning more about this issue and educating others about it may as well be the most important thing during a pandemic as large as this one. My general goal is learning more about how to fix the issue of public safety. I want to tell everyone about the importance of wearing masks. If we want to go back to living normally, traveling, meeting up with friends or colleagues, we need to make sure we’re still following social distancing guidelines and continuing to wear our masks.

I aspire to travel places around the world. This matters to me because there are many places I haven’t been. I’ve always seen pictures of places like Akihabara in Tokyo, Japan. It looks like such a nice place to me and it seems so fun to travel to. I share my interest in traveling with new people I meet and my friends, because someday I’ll hopefully be able to travel with them. Traveling isn’t the only thing that I’m so passionate about. Usually people have something they want to do and they’re passionate about it, and for me, at this point I’m just passionate about seeing people again! It has been so long since I have seen anyone from my old school in person, and since I have seen any of my friends. I don’t think that I’m the only one who feels this way about wearing masks, though. I feel like people in other parts of the world feel like this too, because of their area’s situations.

Recently, people have been talking about lifting mask mandates. Personally, I am not a fan of this idea. If people are thinking of lifting COVID-19 restrictions when there are still places where cases are high and staying high, even more of the population will be affected. One of the places that wanted to reopen, even, was Texas. Texas is one of the places where COVID cases are staying high, and only 12% of their population have gotten the vaccine. Almost 2.3 million people were affected, which is crazy. This issue is significant to everyone. Have you seen the charts of how many cases there are in places like South Dakota or Rhode Island? In this article, it shows this map:

Map of how high COVID cases in an area are depending on their color.

If we look close enough to the darker red areas, there is a key that specifies that those are the areas with the most cases of COVID-19. Fortunately, most areas are lighter which means there are less daily cases, but that does not blow past the places that do have many cases. Communities of people can’t grow and continue like this. It’s a health issue, and we need to focus our attention to it. Even though cases have slowed down in many other areas, us as a population, us as a community, should continue to follow social distancing rules.

In the article Guidance for Wearing Masks by the CDC (Center for Disease Control & Prevention), it says that the virus can be spread by even a few respiratory droplets from one person to another. When people gather and talk to each other without a mask, they can spread the virus so easily. The fact that it can spread like that is scary to imagine. When wearing one, it should fit snugly over your nose and your mouth, the input and output for the virus. We should prevent that from happening and cover these areas to stay safe. Everyone above the age of 2 should wear one around people they aren’t usually around to be careful. Within this article, there is another that goes more in depth about the safety of wearing one. In the article, they mention double masking. Double masking is proven to be more effective than single masking. When wearing a single mask, there are still those corners that can allow respiratory droplets in, which isn’t safe. Wearing more than one mask or double knotting your mask can help counter this issue.

During research, I’ve learned so many more issues within the issue. For example, overcrowding in prisons. Surprisingly, I wasn’t even thinking about how the virus impacted prisons because there are so many people there who are put together in small cells for years. I’ve watched TV shows that show prisons and crowds of people in the yards or in their cafeteria, and it makes me wonder how many people could be infected and spreading it to others. Some of these people could be even getting out soon, and if they are infected they will probably be put back into holding, like a hospital, but then hospitals already have many people who have illnesses. I keep wondering how people manage to separate prisoners and get them masks and socially distance them so they don’t spread the virus to new prisoners, or even who is guarding them.

I drew an image of 2 people who are 6 feet apart and wearing masks.

Wearing a mask is not optional, it is your duty! You might have the chore to do the laundry, or take out the trash. This is just like that. Even though it could seem annoying, it is very important for you to spread the word that this virus isn’t over. If we continue to wear our masks, we’ll be able to breathe in the fresh city air again and meet up with people sooner. So, this is a sign that you should go put on that mask!

Here is my annotated bibliography.

I don’t think anyone imagined 2020 being like this, keeping 6 feet apart from each other, not having normal in-person classes, and staying inside almost all day. Along with a pandemic, the crumbling of the rest of the world & economy is there too. In this image, my mom and my younger brother are standing apart from each other while wearing masks. I decided to take this photograph at a school that’s been under construction since I was young, since it shows how things take a long time to be repaired. This school is walking distance from my home. I have seen this building almost every single day on my way home, and I’ve always wondered when it would finally be finished. The day I took this picture, I actually saw a construction worker’s car leaving the premises. Finally, this place is being fixed up!

I know things take a while to be put back together if they are deeply damaged. For example, people are fighting for their religions, their people, their rights, and themselves. People are making their points through actions instead of words. The BLM movement has been a really big part of 2020, and to make change, some people would loot businesses. I live in West Philadelphia, and some places that were raided and looted happened very close to my home; this hurts, because these are places the community go to shop and live their daily lives. It brings sadness that people have to show their feelings through this type of action. If nobody listens, they have to take action. Still, my family supports this movement, because equality between all races is right, and everyone should be treated as an equal no matter their status, skin color, or ethnicity.

When I took this picture, the weather was chilly, and the sky wasn’t as bright, which caused the color of the image to be more dull. I was satisfied with this, because this year hasn’t been very bright from the pandemic and the personal and political conflicts we’ve faced. It has been a year for change and coming together, and hopefully things will be fixed so we can live normally next year. 2020 has been a building that’s been in repair for far too long, and slowly we’re working together to put it back together.