Week 1

It’s amazing to me how quickly a week can go by!  I have settled in to my living arrangements and even ventured forth a bit over the weekend to check out a local yarn shop.  The weather is proving the most difficult thing to get used to, since I’m from Vancouver, WA- it’s 20+ degrees warmer here and much more humid.

This past week, I narrowed down my project, so I have an idea of what I will be working on now.  I’ve decided to try my hand at learning the hardware aspects of Arduino, even though my previous electronics experience is limited.  The project I’ll be working on is Making Fashion Accessible.  You can read more about it on Michele’s website.  She’s the PhD student that I will be working closely with, as the overall project is hers.  I really liked the idea of working on a project in accessibility.  My role will be working on the scanners or smart tags that could be implemented in clothing to make their information ‘readable’ by a smart phone.

This week my goal is to learn as much as I can about Arduino and fashion and technology.  Michele is going to a conference on Wearable Computing next week, so when she gets back, the real work on the project can start.  I have until then to learn about electronics and wearable hardware.

Even though it’s only been one week, I can already safely say that I am really glad I have had the opportunity to do this this summer.  I have learned a lot about grad school in the last week and I am more certain than ever that this is what I would like to do next year.  I am super excited to be working with such meaningful research!