Autumn

EDUC 200B: INTRODUCTION TO QUALITATIVE RESEARCH METHODS

I learned to recognize myself as an instrument of inquiry, acknowledging how my identity as a Filipino-American filmmaker from rural Alaska shapes what I notice, whom I trust, and which stories I'm positioned to hear. The course challenged my assumption that good observation means achieving objectivity; instead, I discovered that rigor comes from making my subjectivity visible and interrogating how it filters my interpretation. Working with four classmates, I applied these principles by conducting qualitative research at a CrossFit gym, exploring how coaches facilitate community among athletes of vastly different skill levels, from beginners to advanced competitors, all training in the same class. Through Geertz's concepts of thin and thick description, I learned the difference between simply reporting what I see (a coach modifying a workout) and interpreting what it means within its cultural context (how intentional scaling creates a sense of belonging by validating each athlete's personal progress rather than comparing them to others). This distinction shifted how I approach user research, pushing me beyond surface-level observations toward understanding the layered meanings and power dynamics embedded in every learning environment I study.

EDUC 229A: LEARNING DESIGN AND TECHNOLOGY SEMINAR

In the LDT Seminar, I arrived with StoryBridge in mind, a platform designed to weave audio, visual, and written content into unified learning experiences. The idea felt right because video storytelling had transformed me from an underperforming student into someone who could think in ways traditional academics never allowed. I abandoned the project immediately when the program started. When See Stories lost funding, I pivoted to hospitality, my undergraduate major, thinking at least there I could get a job. The quarter forced me to gather insights from scholarship, learners, practitioners, and researchers to validate opportunities for innovation. I reconnected with Cornell professors and interviewed HR leaders at Radiate Hospitality Management, learning how corporate offices design professional development from afar while properties grapple with real problems. Then I realized I was doing the same thing. Pea's concept of distributed intelligence helped me understand this failure. I had been treating learning design as an individual cognitive act rather than recognizing that intelligence is distributed across people, artifacts, and contexts. By designing from my desk rather than from the ground, I missed the structures that would make learning meaningful. So I started conversations with Aya about her personal finance initiative for students. This topic is personal in ways hospitality training did not. My parents worked 40 years as cannery laborers and still don't have retirement. If I'm going to spend nine months building a learning experience, I want it to be something I'd fight for. This quarter taught me that storytelling isn't a platform I abandoned; instead, it's about how I listen and make sense of the gap between what people think matters and what actually matters on the ground.

EDUC 281: TECHNOLOGY FOR LEARNERS

I explored how technology can improve learning by examining the theories, frameworks, and research behind effective digital tools. The course pushed me to move from surface-level feature analysis toward understanding the deeper design decisions that shape learner experiences. Throughout the quarter, I completed an Analysis of a Learning Tool (ALT) focused on Typsy, an online hospitality learning platform, evaluating how well its design aligns with learning science principles and serves its target users. I described the tool's features, assessed whether its design demonstrated understanding of hospitality workers and their learning contexts, and proposed improvements grounded in theories of how people develop professional skills. By applying conceptual frameworks from the learning sciences to a real product, I learned to evaluate how a tool works, why it works, for whom, and under what conditions.

EDUC 333A: INTRODUCTION TO LEARNING SCIENCES

I learned about theoretical frameworks that expanded my understanding of learning. The course helped me understand situated cognition and sociocultural theory, which position learning as inseparable from the contexts, tools, and communities in which learning occurs. Reading about embodied cognition helped me understand why the documentary filmmaking workshops I led in Alaska were effective. Students physically operated cameras, navigated their communities conducting interviews, and used their bodies to frame shots that reflected their cultural perspectives. The concept of teachers as learners resonated with my experience training veteran educators who initially resisted technology but transformed once they saw themselves not as deficient users but as learners engaged in legitimate peripheral participation within a community of practice. This course gave me vocabulary for what I had been doing, like designing learning experiences that honor funds of knowledge, scaffold participation, and recognize that cognition is distributed across people, tools, and environments rather than locked inside isolated individuals.

EDUC 377K: PHILANTHROPHY: STRATEGY, IMPACT & LEADERSHIP

I learned to approach social change with the same rigor I apply to business strategy and user research. The course challenged me to shift from emotionally driven giving toward high-impact philanthropy grounded in systems thinking and measurable outcomes. I developed my own theory of change focused on increasing college enrollment for rural Alaskan students from 46% to 60% by 2035, approximately 500 additional students annually from communities under 10,000 people. This framework forced me to articulate assumptions that the primary barrier to rural college access is not information but narrative capacity, that students possess extraordinary cultural assets they cannot yet articulate in college applications, and that storytelling interventions can bridge the aspiration-attainment gap documented in rural Alaska Native communities. The most transformative part of the course was the grantmaking practicum with Andreessen Philanthropies, where my cohort assessed Silicon Valley nonprofits and collectively decided which two organizations would each receive $10,000 grants. This experience taught me to evaluate organizations not just on mission alignment but on operational capacity, financial sustainability, and their ability to achieve stated outcomes.