Why did you enroll in this course (motivation, prior interests)?
Being a Lehigh Valley Social Impact Fellow will give me a hands-on learning experience in research. Conducting research and presenting my work in conferences will equip me with valuable skills as well as experiences. This program will give me the opportunity to build relationships with a cohort of intelligent students and work with esteemed faculty members who are pioneers in their respective fields. Moreover, it will enable me to explore different disciplines and make me comfortable with the uncomfortable.
I’m extremely passionate about research and have had a strong interest in it since high school. Through my previous research experiences, I’ve learned to think critically and problem solve. Through this fellowship, I hope to build on my previous research experiences and grow as a learner. As a prospective Computer Science major, I’m intrigued by virtual reality and am eager to learn more about it through this fellowship. I’m looking forward to exploring this rapidly growing domain and build on my programming skills.
Most importantly, through this program, I hope to make an impact. Being a woman in the South Asian community, growing up, I didn’t have as much access to STEM learning experiences as I would have ideally liked to. Through this fellowship, I hope to help change that by not only helping make STEM learning experiences more easily accessible to students from a younger age (especially girls) but also making them excited to further explore STEM-related fields after engaging in virtual reality games.
Along with making an impact with respect to STEM education, through this fellowship, I hope to make an impact towards a more sustainable and environmentally conscious future. Our project focuses on educating students specifically about the Lehigh Valley Watershed through virtual reality games because having a clear understanding of watersheds is crucial to make decisions regarding a sustainable future. Pressing environmental issues like air pollution, land usage, water quality, etc can only be tackled once concepts about watersheds are properly understood. Only then can one effectively strategize to deal with these urgent environmental issues. Thus, I hope to make an impact by educating future generations about watersheds so that we can work towards a more sustainable future.
How do you envision this course making you a better <your major> student?
As a prospective Computer Science major, being a member of this project would definitely make me a better Computer Science student. Through this fellowship, I will be learning a new interface called Unity which is used to create immersive virtual reality games. Moreover, I would receive the opportunity to learn to program in a programming language called C#. Thus, my programming skills would definitely get enhanced. Since I have been programming for less than a year, I’m certain that through this project, I would learn new concepts and skills. Moreover, I have never worked with a team of programmers before so I’m excited to do that in this fellowship. I would receive the opportunity to collaborate with other Computer Science students and learn together. Furthermore, this fellowship would serve as an introduction to the realm of virtual reality and game programming for me. I have always been curious about these fields but have never received the opportunity to actually explore them. Thus, this project would enable me to do that. By working in different areas of Computer Science and programming, I hope to gain a deeper understanding of my passion and area of interest within the realm of Computer Science.
The World Health Organization estimates that over one billion people who need eyeglasses do not have access to them. The vast majority of these people live in developing countries like Kenya where there is barely one optometrist per one million people. Given the high poverty levels, access to eyeglasses is almost nonexistent. Lack of proper eyeglasses severely impacts people and their livelihoods by decreasing their productivity at work, limiting or eliminating new opportunities, affecting their quality of life, deteriorating their general health, and possibly leading to (preventable) blindness. What solution do you propose to address this problem?
Given the high poverty levels in these countries, I think this problem requires government intervention or United Nations intervention. Since people in these countries are unable to afford eyeglasses, there should be a government fund that sponsors eyeglasses for people. Governments should see this as an investment because lack of proper eyeglasses negatively impacts work output thus affecting the countries’ economies. If people had access to proper eye glasses, their productivity at work would increase and hence boost the countries’ economies. Since eyeglasses could be an alien concept for citizens of developing countries, to combat social ridicule of people opting to wear eyeglasses, people should be educated about the importance of eyeglasses and public figures (like politicians and celebrities) should lead by example and wear them. This would influence the general public and make them view eyeglasses more favourably.