STIP Student Quang Vo Focused on Developing Novel Mathematical Algorithms, Building a Web Application TATA

Hello! My name is Quang Vo, and I am a Computer Science major. My summer impact project for the Summer 2019 was focused on developing novel mathematical algorithms to solve biology problems, and building a web application named TATA (Transcription Factor Association Tool for Analysis) for those findings. The web app has an intuitive user interface that not only makes the input of biological data straightforward, but also produces output data in a simple form that can be easily understood by a non-science audience. 

On a weekly basis, I worked closely with Dr. Tyrus Berry, Dr. Luis Rodriguez, and Prof. Shanshan Cuito discuss the requirements for the web app, and I gained a great relationship with all of my mentors. Also, I was very fortunate to collaborate with other Biology, Math, Web Design, and Computer Science students that helped me improve my communication and teamwork skills. My long-term goal is to become a full stack developer, and TATAweb app was built using React.js(JavaScript, HTML, CSS) for front end, Plotly.js for graphing, and Django (Python) for back end. Therefore, I am very grateful for the opportunity to pursue this summer impact project with support from OSCAR, which is very beneficial for me to practice and become well-prepared for my future career after graduation. 

One thing I discovered this term is what a long-term project looks like in my field, and how often the project doesn’t go as planned. Even though there were numerous times I found the project frustrating, it became more rewardable when looking at the final outcomes. Every time I hit a roadblock, I needed to adapt and find an alternative way to solve the problem. I learned more about my own work habits, learned how to manage time and improve deadline management skills. I am forever grateful to OSCAR, my mentors, and everyone else who has supported me in this summer impact project.

STIP Student Phuong Tran Worked as a Full Stack Web Developer

My name is Phuong Tran, I am a sophomore in Computer Science with a major in Data Science. During the fall 2019 semester, I have been actively looking for internship and found OSCAR’s poster. I first got interested in this field because I has been picking up on Python as my first coding language. I have always dreamed of becoming a Data Analytic Engineering, I love working with analyzing data and creating databases. I get to work with both front end, back end technologies, and trying to sync the two.

During work days, I mostly merge math algorithm into existing back end server (Django REST framework) while in front end server, I implement design elements from HTML/CSS while giving them functionalities through React.js/JavaScript. I also deploy my code from local host (personal laptop) to the server (Apache) to make sure the app is up to date. In order to keep the work flow clean as well as reserved the code for next summer team, my team set up a git hub repository to store all the assets and codes with description on how to install and run the program (both back end and front end). 

For the internship I have learned a lot of new frameworks, how to tackle problems that I haven’t seen before, and the most important thing is my communication skill has enhanced a lot. The messages that I want to send to future students who will be continue on this project is that try get the local host server running correctly first before doing any implementations and it might be really helpful to read the comment we wrote.

URSP Student Dylan McFarland Analyzes the Dynamic Socio-political Landscape in Central America

I had never thought about how I became interested in my own project until I saw my classmates present on their widely varying research and found myself thinking, “How in the world did they even come up with such a thing?” I have always been fascinated by other cultures different from my own. Studying Spanish as my second language exposed me to a deeper understanding of the Latin American region and the experiences of the people therein.

After participating in the Global Politics Fellowship at the Arlington campus I began to think more critically about democratization and political participation and civil society. Therefore, when presented with the opportunity to conduct an independent research project, the dynamic socio-political landscape in Central America seemed a perfect subject. I would like to continue this research in the future and this has led me to want to pursue a career in human rights advocacy work where I hope this project can be used as an example of my research experience and writing samples for grad school applications and job applications.

This project has added to my weekly routine a hefty amount of reading relevant literature on the subject. Some weeks I attend off-campus lectures at Latin America centric NGOs in DC (all weeks I am thinking about the formulation of my research and methodologies). I have discovered through this research deeper implications about “agency” and political action. Being so close to this project and never having become bored or frustrated with it has cemented within the realization that I have a real passion for it as well.

STIP Students Santiago Jauregui and Katherine Tran Examine Effects of Alcohol Packaging on Youth Through Eye Tracking

Like most of our fellow research assistants on the "Eye-Tracking for Alcohol Packaging Appeal" research team, we weren't quite sure what to expect in regards to our daily tasks and weekly objectives. Over the duration of the project, our team would meet on a weekly basis to discuss current challenges we were facing and delegate duties among ourselves, which could change or add on to the previous weeks' tasks depending on the project's current needs. Under the direction of our primary investigator, Dr. Matthew Rossheim, and Dr. Matthew Peterson we proceeded in two phases, the first phase was to prepare material for our experiment and recruit participants to undergo our study, and the second phase was collecting data via running test participants through eye-tracking technology. 

Throughout the month of July, most of our time was devoted to running test participants. Each participant required two research participants to oversee the experiment and handle any troubleshooting with the eye-tracking software. Upon arrival to our eye-tracking lab participants were greeted and went over their informed consent forms with the research assistants, before being tested by us for normal vision and color blindness. We were responsible for overseeing the experiment as participants ran through a programmed slideshow of images the team had developed, while an infrared eye tracking sensor monitored the movement of the participants' pupils, recording the location and time spent looking at objects in each image. All participant data was de-identified by us so that the participants remained anonymous with a three-digit code in addition to their age and gender were the only identifiers recorded. 

One thing we learned this summer was the crucial importance of voluntary participation in research efforts involving human subjects, and the resilience required to continue working diligently when research plans don’t always go as planned. Our team faced considerable challenges recruiting youth participants this summer and had to constantly revise our methods and procedures in order to collect a large enough data sample. Meeting our desired number of participants was extremely important to us as the results of our research would be used by our primary investigator to improve youth public health and safety through regulatory implications.

URSP Student Liam Timmons Investigates Incumbency Advantage in City Council Elections

I researched the impact of demographic characteristics on incumbency advantage in Virginia’s city council elections. While local politics are a topic of great concern among my fellow Government and International Politics majors, these very important elections often get swept under the rug. In my hometown of Princeton, New Jersey, however, city council and school board elections are a big deal, with lots of campaigning and money involved. This seemed out of the ordinary, so I wanted to find out just how tough it is to win a city council election. After I found out that nationally, congressional representatives almost always win re-election if they want it, incumbency advantage seemed like a good place to start. 

On a weekly basis, my work usually consisted of data collection, writing and reviewing literature, and coding in R. City council election data is often spotty or non-existent, and I spent a lot of time in local newspaper archives trying to find incumbency status or election results. I also had to organize this data by hand, because the Virginia Department of Elections data was not formatted how I needed it. I read lots of literature on how to best estimate incumbency advantage, and all my coding and modelling was done in R. Because my R skills were a little rusty, I spent a lot of time day-to-day trying to figure out how to get my code to do what I wanted it to do. Overall, though, I felt the work I carried out day-to-day was valuable in many respects. 

Throughout this research, I’ve found the URSP program to be a valuable and enriching experience. I’ve had opportunities to share my research, learn more about the world around me, and contribute to scholarly research on issues that are important to me