nina’s 3 ideas 4 thesis

welcome. here’s a little table of contents.
click on the idea you’d like to learn more about.

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UI / UX Design Open Source Lesson Plan

What’s the first thing you think of?

I’ve discovered an interest in user interface / user experience design recently, and other students and I have seen the gap in the IMM curriculum: we found out about UI / UX by accident. UI / UX came as a particular surprise to me because even though I’m an English & IMM double major, I had no idea about the industry. Although we are interactive multimedia, there are little-to-no lessons on user experience design. There’s no class that sits us down and asks us to analyze the UI / UX we see everyday, what works, what doesn’t work, and why they might’ve made those decisions.

I understand this is probably a function of the fact that IMM is still relatively new and small, so there might not be the budget for a class like this or another professor to teach it. I also know classes need to focus on specific topics and that some are just so broad it’s impossible to cover in one class, but I believe UI / UX to be so fundamental to IMM that there should be a 100-level course on it.

So for this project, I’d tap into my education background (I started as an English Secondary Education major and I still plan to teach later on) and I’d design that class. I’d make a lesson plan and a free, public website on UI / UX design. The lesson plan would be aimed at higher ed, but I’d try to include lessons for high school design classes as well, because I think I’d’ve been interested in it way back when. Hopefully then other students can explore the world of UI / UX, a part of the design process that is often forgotten (because we design to be forgotten 🙁 ).

ideas

For this project, I’d look into what makes a good user experience, what makes a bad one, and read resources on what others have done to teach UI / UX. I know other schools offer classes in it, even majors and masters programs (human-centered design), so I’ll look into those and gather resources. I’ll then concentrate all my findings into a website which will be public and free to use, for others to learn more about UI and UX. I’ll also work on a lesson plan (that I’ll post on the website) for an IMM course / minicourse on specifically UI / UX writing, perhaps cross-listed with LIT so my English friends can learn about it too.

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Alternate Reality Game for Freshmen 2021

What if you can’t do the first thing?

I’m fascinated with Alternate Reality Games (ARG). 21 Pilots did one this summer and although I didn’t actively participate (there were way too many people working on it for me to understand what was happening in real time), I watched it closely for a few days and entered in the codes and followed along, like walking behind marathon runners. I’ve also had the same experience with the Gravity Falls ARG and the codes at the end of Gravity Falls episodes–I always knew they were there and I’ve been interested in them, but I’ve never been “on time” to participate or good enough at the puzzles to compete with the big leaguers solving puzzles every day.

When quarantine started, I started thinking about how WTSR could get interested Freshmen involved. Other clubs on campus were struggled just as bad, if not worse, to figure out how to get new members. Around mid-May I thought: What if there was an ARG involving clubs? What if Freshmen and transfers worked together to solve puzzles that brought them to different club websites, social medias; had them attending Zoom meetings and collaborating? It was too good of an idea to pass up, so I pitched it to WTSR, but we eventually decided we had nowhere near enough time to work on something like that.

Then I started thinking about thesis– what if I made an ARG in the fall / spring that the Freshmen could play next fall? I would have significantly more time and resources, and I can hide clues even earlier in their TCNJ experience, like in the first emails they receive.

I’d also like to learn how to build an ARG for anywhere I go in the future– onboarding as a remote intern was very difficult this summer, and I think if there was a little mystery puzzle game going on, I would’ve gotten to meet and bond with many more interns much faster. Hopefully I can do that for the Freshmen 🙂

The plan would also be to outline my entire process, to hopefully make a lesson plan out of it to give to IMM so that perhaps every Fall semester the ARG class runs to set up the ARG for the next Freshmen class. That way, it’s kind of like an initiation for the freshmen and a way for them to feel more part of the IMM family from the start. It’s like a secret handshake.

ideas

I don’t want to share too many ideas here in case I go with this idea and a freshmen finds it next year and tries to cheat the system. But generally, I’d like to tell a story through the ARG (as is common), maybe about a new TCNJ department called Extraspatial Studies (from Watchmen) or something like that, so that maybe there’s some kind of paranormal conflict going on and a timetraveller is trying to contact the IMM freshmen because Only they can stop [whatever is happening]! I’m hoping to include steps of the puzzles that include visiting places on campus (if possible– I’m not sure if this will be possible given COVID, so I might try to include things they can find online and/or go to see in person if allowed). I’d also like to hide info in emails, maybe even on Discord and PAWs, and maybe get Marketing and Brand Management involved (I’ve been working there for like 2 years now)… I have other ideas written down on paper in my notebook so they can’t leak. I’ll also need to reflect on what Freshmen should be doing / seeing when they start at TCNJ (tcnj.edu, PAWs, checking their email, IMM discord, AIMM building, Eick, Library, Roar app, etc.), so that will hopefully give light to some more ideas so I can lead them to places they should get familiar with.

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Accurate Stars in Minecraft Resourcepack

What’s something you’d
love to learn?

I like stars, constellations, astronomy, and cartography (also: celestial cartography, uranography). I thought it might be interesting to learn how to make a ‘lite mod’ (aka a resourcepack) or a regular mod for Minecraft to add in constellations, maybe even a telescope that would highlight constellations?

Then possibly make an accurate map for the northern / southern hemispheres? I’ve always wondered if there are constellations in Minecraft that are helpful for navigation (apparently so). I wish there was a way to make a star map like a land map!

I have no experience in making any kind of Minecraft mod, though I do have experience with command blocks (shout out to Miles & IMMovation 1!). I am also familiar with Java (it was my first coding language) and I’ve played Minecraft since Beta (or maybe Alpha??) so I think this would be an interesting challenge for me to try and add new items and sequences to the game.

ideas