This is the first installment in Sophomore, Sayelis’, journal regarding her experiences working on a project partnering with MAOarch. She, along with some of her peers, will continue to provide updates as to their teams’ progress over the course of the process. The students’ next check in will be at the end of March, so stay tuned for a future update.
On February 26, I met the architects from MAOarch again. This time, my team presented a brand new project for this school year. I was so excited because it meant that I would be receiving feedback from actual experts who would help me get better and reach a higher potential. Over the summer, I was so shy because I didn’t know what they were going to say, and I had no idea if I was good enough (I just didn’t fit in. I didn’t even understand the concepts of scaling or even softwares such as AutoCAD). I couldn’t even ask questions because of how shy and nervous I was. And let’s not forget to mention that I barely knew any of my peers, both teammates and the opposing team either. BUT, going to the architect’s new office location and meeting them once again, I will admit that I was very hyper. It seemed like I couldn’t stay quiet. Over the past few months as a sophomore, I interacted with almost every student in that conference room with me, and they knew I was hardworking and dedicated. Some even wanted to be on my team as well, and although I like my team as it is and I wouldn’t want it to change, it made me feel happy that some kids actually like what I do and how I work.
In terms of what my team presented, we made our presentation as thoughtful for customers as we could. We wanted to enhance customer experience, make the place popular to increase merchandise sales, and create opportunities for those who can’t make it on their own. I presented with my captain, Morgan, and it all turned out the way we hoped it would – leaving everyone in that conference absolutely speechless once it was time to ask questions. We had an idea with the aesthetic of the retail spot as well the merchandise which would be street wear, mostly sneakers. Believe it or not, I actually designed one of the sneakers and Ouzaipha (to whom I rarely speak) actually found them impressive and asked if I actually made them on my own. It is an orange shoe inspired by the video game, Subway Surfers “jump shoe power-up,” but I did design them to be as good as I could. Truthfully, I wish I had a pair for myself too. Maybe one day I’d have the money to get them made for me.
This entire experience has been really fun and I am looking forward to a few things:
Updating this document so that I could look back to it and see how much I have grown!!
My next 2 meetings with Mao and her lovely team.
Working on our project while making huge progress each time.