iSchool Capstone

2014

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Intercollegiate Athletics Leadership (IAL) Database

The IAL Database is a storage and retrieval system for identifying the leadership (head coaches, university presidents, etc.) and institutional movement patterns of Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) programs. Using this application, IAL researchers will be able to evaluate the average term and turnover of the leadership of FBS programs, providing UW and other institutions the opportunity to make informed decisions on future contracts. This system provides a lens for institutions, as well as the public, to begin to understand what has grown into a multi-billion dollar industry. Our team took the previously disjointed processes that included paper based records and spreadsheets, and centralized everything into one database with an intuitive web-interface. This web-application now allows the IAL staff to easily manipulate data and generate custom visualizations and reports to further their understanding of the phenomena known as the coaching carousel. 
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iSchool Digital Asset Management

Over the past year the Information School’s Communications Department has experienced an increased ingestion of digital photographic material; these images, which total over 5,000, were being stored on an internal network drive with no standardized naming, organizational schema structure, or embedded metadata information. As these images are imperative in promoting the iSchool’s accomplishments, achievements, advances, and offerings—in a variety of print and digital media sources—the Communications Department sought to create a digital asset management system. By fashioning hierarchal structures, naming and taxonomy standards, and metadata templates, all of which are compatible with Adobe products, I was able to create a digital asset management system and organizational structure that is mindful of its current and future users. Ultimately, this will allow for the photographic content to be more easily accessible all while stimulating workflow and collaboration in promoting the iSchool brand. How are your digital assets working for you?
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Jefferson County Jail User Needs Analysis

Despite the Jefferson County Jail’s proximity to the city’s public library, no formal relationship currently exists between the two organizations. In order to better serve a currently unserved population, a user needs analysis was conducted on the jail for the purpose of informing the library about possible outreach opportunities. This analysis identified the scope of programs and services currently available to inmates while they are incarcerated and upon release, as well as community organizations that are currently providing programs and services at the jail. The analysis also discovered gaps in the current services and programs being offered to inmates. Identifying these gaps better enables the library to develop an outreach program that is relevant to the jail population.
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KEXP Schema Design & Media Ingest

Seattle based radio station KEXP, a renowned music discovery powerhouse, acts as a launching pad for artists and as a go-to source for music enthusiasts worldwide. This reputation has been achieved despite their library and archives remaining in underdeveloped information silos without a unified approach or management system. To address this problem KEXP is investing in a new media asset management system to act as a central place where all assets can be ingested, processed, stored, indexed, searched and accessed. This project aims to ease access and bring curator and listener discovery to new and previously unimagined levels by developing a metadata schema capable of encompassing the entire collection. With the schema complete, focus can shift to an ingest plan for KEXP’s collections and an automated, human-supervised, metadata cleanup process. These efforts will improve user experiences, yield new insights into the collection and unlock value currently dormant in the library.
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Knowledge Crystallization and Clinical Priorities: Evaluating How Physicians Collect and Synthesize Patient-Related Data

Information seeking and synthesis are time consuming processes for physicians. Although systems have the potential to simplify these tasks, future improvements must be based on an understanding of how physicians perform these tasks during clinical prioritization. We engaged physicians in semi-structured focus groups, and found that data is collected to categorize and prioritize patients according to expected clinical course. When data does not support these expectations, or when categorization indicates potential for morbidity, physicians increase efforts to act or re-categorize patients. We identified a standard prioritization workflow that differs slightly by medical specialty. These findings lay a foundation to advance information displays that facilitate information processing by physicians in clinical care environments.
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Leto

Project Leto consists of an augmented reality mobile app, ARtemis, and a collaborative virtual web environment, Apollo. With the amount of people attending networking events it is often difficult to make meaningful and lasting connections. ARtemis allows for instant information and social connections by providing virtual badges with relevant information viewable through AR technology. Apollo provides a platform for project management and remote collaboration, which is often hindered by the diverse amount of tools in different locations. It integrates and organizes the current resources available to users (Github, Google Drive, Lucidchart, etc.) into a single workspace that clearly outlines the project. Together they embody Leto’s goal of supporting social and professional networking, communication, and collaboration. Success is gauged by the time saved in the communication process with ARtemis and the actual workflow with Apollo. Together, ARtemis and Apollo build an ecosystem where people are encouraged to collaborate and solve problems.
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Library Presence for Online Students at Satellite Campuses - Northeastern University Seattle

There was a time when an academic degree was earned on a physical campus, but those times have changed. As the mode of educational delivery has shifted to satellite and online campus options, the academic library system has had to adjust in order to meet the needs of their students and instructors. My project looks at the challenges and possibilities of a library presence for online students at Northeastern University Seattle. Realizing the strength of academic programs is found in the strength of its library system, I used existing scholarship and models to imagining new library possibilities and create recommendation that will equip NEU Libraries to be the information core for their online and satellite students.
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Lives Change @ Your Library

The Bellingham Public Library offers community connection through programs, but the experience is fleeting. Patrons repeatedly request recordings of library events. Lives Change @ Your Library is a pilot program that digitally captures patron interviews so that people can access this local oral history at any time through the library website. Interviews focus on how libraries have transformed the lives of eight library patrons. Outreach and interviews occurred over three months. Patrons were all volunteers with an age range of twenty-one to eighty-seven. Four men and four women participated. Some of the topics raised were homelessness, adoption, physical disability, loss of a spouse, loss of a job, finding work, being inspired, and being empowered to find one’s own answers. It’s a way for patrons to share patron created content with each other as well as providing data to library staff members on what resources might be required for future projects.
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MelonYeah: A Nightclub Events Platform

Our project addresses the lack of unified platforms between nightclubs who want to advertise events and customers who want to search for nightclub event information in a easy way. Currently, nightclubs either advertise events on their own websites, or create Facebook events. Therefore, if a customer wants to look for a nightclub event, he will have to manually search through many sites. To address this problem, we designed a mobile application with two interfaces that allows nightclubs to advertise their events so customers can find the information in the same platform effectively in a timely manner. We gauge success by comparing the speed of customers in finding information using this mobile application. Our solution enables nightclubs and customers to exchange information more efficiently in their mobile phones.
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MIST – Mobile Cloud Infrastructure for Environmental Disaster Relief

In the event of an environmental disaster, coordinating relief efforts involves hundreds of stakeholders, and mistakes can mean the difference between life and death. Accurate information is crucial, and a lack of infrastructure can impede collaboration and communication between rescue teams. In our research, we met with emergency volunteers, disaster researchers, and the Snohomish County Helicopter Rescue Team to identify user needs in disaster scenarios. We leveraged our findings to develop MIST – a ruggedized, portable server infrastructure designed to bring the power of cloud technology to isolated emergency situations. With custom engineered hardware and software, MIST provides a centralized environment to communicate and share data on desktop and mobile devices. In addition, we developed an Android application that automatically transfers data between MIST and other rescue teams. With MIST, rescue workers can rapidly collaborate and share information between teams, reducing avoidable mistakes, and helping them save more lives.