Reflection: Senior Capstone
Programming, whether it’s in Scratch or C, is typically the start of the ride for students interested in Computer Science. The amount of educational content available through a couple searches is impossible to digest in a lifetime, and is a result of programmers taking the next step beyond coding. Over the course of a semester, my senior capstone has acted as a wine tasting, introducing me to a variety of different Computer Science fields that I may have not heard of. Some entirely technical and others legal & ethical. This course introduced these topics through research and discussions, technical exercises, and team work on a Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) project. Little did I know at the time, but these activities would act as a catalyst for further research and involvement in FOSS and software design. While this diverse range of exercises played an integral part in teaching us how to contribute to FOSS projects, I found the research and discussion assignments and engaging with a FOSS community to be the most impactful parts of the course.
Research and Discussions
The research and discussion assignments acted as an introduction to a variety of Computer Science fields that were designated for this semester. The research portion of the activities consisted of reviewing a set of readings and/or videos, asking questions in a discussion thread, and pursuing additional research based on our questions on parts of the readings. While the discussion portion of the activities consisted of the class answering a set of questions, these discussions typically resulted in debates between class members when there was confusion around a topic. I found these debates to be an excellent experience since students were encouraged to question the answers of their peers based on personal experiences and interpretations of the readings. While the setting for these discussions was a private video call, I believe these same types of debates can be carried out in a students’ community. Most notably, when a student doesn’t understand why a certain action is carried out or when they question an action.
Engaging with a FOSS Community
While this portion of the course was performed independently, observing how other classmates communicated and reached out to their communities was interesting and educational. The actual interactions were typical, but how the other teams gained access into different levels of their communities taught our team how to replicate their success. Additionally, we learned that becoming more active in a community required greater participation in the contribution process. Since the contribution process ranges from providing insight to developing code, it is a major part of conversation because it encapsulates a wide variety of topics. I believe this same theme of gaining access to a community by contributing to their goals is reflected in other Computer Science and non-Computer Science fields. For example, at my previous college, a large component of the Software Development club was participating in hackathons. To gain better access to this community, I began attending hackathons and participating in team workshops.
While this capstone is only half way over, I believe this first semester has improved my technical and communication skills so that I can pursue various types of civic engagement. I’m looking forward to expanding this insight next semester when we go into ethical, legal, and social issues.
