iSchool Capstone

2022

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Analytics Tool to Understand COVID-19 Economic Impacts and Evaluate Programmatic Options

The City of Seattle seeks to answer the question: “How might we understand the economic fallout of COVID-19 from a data perspective and identify where interventions could be most effective?” Our team experimented with locational and demographic data to gain a comprehensive view of the economic impacts residents face due to COVID-19. These deliverables include block-specific maps and predictive regression models to see which areas and groups are most economically vulnerable to COVID-19. The resulting deliverables assist City Departments in making data-informed decisions to help shape City policies and programs and inform the larger city ecosystem of community-based organizations.
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Are You Nuts?: A Gamified Approach to Combating Misinformation

Misinformation is an escalating threat to modern society. Seemingly unlimited access to an ever-increasing volume of information allows for false or inaccurate content to spread easily. We look to ensure that everyone has the intellectual and social tools to be resilient and contributing members of our information society. "Are You Nuts?" is a free online collaborative game designed to empower players to combat misinformation in a remarkably fun, amusing, and innovative manner. Our game teaches players to engage in healthy information consumption and sharing habits, helps raise awareness of information vulnerabilities, and builds compassionate concern for others.
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Artistree: Connect with Fashion Creatives in Your Community

For beginner fashion creatives hoping to break through in the fashion industry, finding an inclusive community to work, learn, and grow from can be daunting. We designed Artistree, a mobile application, to connect fashion creatives to those nearby them where they can receive support, collaborate on projects together, attend workshops, and share their creations. Artistree leverages technology to build a welcoming community that helps people develop their skills and demonstrates that mistakes are a part of fashion artistry.
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Aware: Privacy Management Dashboard for Facebook Data

Aware is a web application that helps Facebook users retrieve their personal data, understand their Facebook activity, and adjust their privacy settings. Our team was inspired to create Aware because we noticed that young adults do not understand their Facebook data and how to protect it, despite their deep concern for information privacy. Aware solves this problem by helping Facebook users make sense of various personal data, including ads, groups, politics, and interests information, and helping them manage their privacy settings. Our hope is that through Aware, users experience a greater sense of safety and control over their Facebook experience.
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BARK: Your Virtual Support Animal

BARK! is a platform that provides digital companionship with a virtual support animal. While traditional emotional support animals are a great resource for those who are struggling with their mental wellbeing, they remain inaccessible to many who could benefit from a support animal. Through simple interactions with the virtual pet, mental check-ins, assistance with scheduling, and information about real emotional support animals, BARK! strives to provide individuals with a sense of companionship and support that a traditional emotional support animal would provide, in a significantly more accessible medium.
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Behind the Bar: Harnessing Information for Advocacy in the Hospitality Industry

Working with the New Hospitality Institute and building upon research from the H.E.A.R.D. Collective, this capstone builds an online space for hospitality workers and interested academics to contribute research around this industry not often studied with a data-driven sociological lens. This online space first acts as an archive of public policy created or activated by the pandemic relevant to hospitality workers in the United States, and will hopefully develop into portal to deal with a variety of labor concerns in the service industry.
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Between Essential and Expendable: Seattle Gig Workers' Experiences of Precarity through the Covid-19 Pandemic

Previous research has established a clear need for labor protections for app-based workers. And, prominent legislative debates have focused on reclassification - attempting to recognize on-demand platform work as outside the purview of traditional independent contracts. However, there has been relatively little research to understand how policies outside of reclassification impact on-demand workers. Drawing on focus groups and recurring interviews with a cohort of 50 participants in the Seattle area, we assess workers’ experiences over a two-year period in order to evaluate the role of hazard pay and sick time established by the City of Seattle during the Covid-19 pandemic.
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BeWell: Helping high school students build inter-generational connections

Isolated seniors and disconnected teens - our application aims to bridge the inter-generational gap between youth and elders in the community. As service hours are required for Seattle Public Schools students, our platform allows them to acquire these hours through connecting them to seniors in the community who may need help. Seniors request help for small household tasks by posting on the platform, where students can then pick up the ones which match their schedules. The more time young and old people spend together, the more both parties benefit.
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Birthing a Capstone: A Prenatal and Postpartum Health Toolkit for Public Librarians

Pregnant people are overwhelmed by the vast plethora of information about birth and postpartum while simultaneously feeling lost and without agency. Using NNLM, PubMed, and MedlinePlus, we conducted research on their information-seeking behavior and created a library toolkit for public librarians to create materials for their patrons about maternal health. Our resulting toolkit includes handouts, social media tools, inclusive vocabulary, and bookmarks that are ready-to-go or customizable. Our project makes a difference because the published toolkit on NNLM’s website will increase health literacy and empower library patrons in local communities to be an informed participant in their health decisions.
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BlockHealth: Empowering Healthcare workers with the Blockchain

In today's competitive job market, credentials are increasingly used to identify a worker's skills and experience. Current credential practices lack the ability for an individual to verify this information and build trust between workers and employers. BlockHealth aims to provide workers with credible ownership of the credentials they earned through the decentralized nature of the Ethereum blockchain. This project was sponsored by Last Myle LLC. The initial target user group for this product is healthcare workers.