Final Capstone Reflection Journal Entry 

 
The last requirement of the Capstone Project prior to your presentation is to
reflect on the process by writing a final journal reflection. You will need to answer
ALL required questions.  
Please use PARAGRAPHS IN YOUR WRITING. YOU MUST INCLUDE DETAILS IN
YOUR RESPONSES. 
___________________________________________________________________ 
 The Capstone is a unique and demanding challenge. In completing it,
what did you learn about your subject? Your skill set? Yourself?  
  
 
 How is your project relevant to you, the school or the community-at-
large? 
 
 
 How did you demonstrate the six Core Competencies throughout this
project? (See attached Core Competency sheet) 
 
 
 What impact if any did your Capstone project have? 
 
 
 Thinking about the whole process and your finished product, what
are you most proud of?  
 
 
 What was a difficulty you encountered and how did you solve the
problem? 
  
 
 
 What is one thing about your finished project you wish you could
change? Why? 
  
 
 What advice would you give to a student who will be completing
their Capstone Project next year?  
  
 What source from your research helped you the most? (or least?). 
 
 
 What is one thing about your approach to your project that you wish
you could change? Why? 
 
My capstone was focused on the question, “Can AIs take over optometry?”. By
completing it, I learned that the answer to that question is No. To find out that
answer, I completed 40 hours of shadowing my optometrist observing what roles in
the job would need to have a human in the room. While shadowing my
optometrist, I learned that many medical conditions can be spotted by looking at
the eye, and some of them need to be handled urgently for the patient’s safety. In
situations like that, the patient’s safety can be at risk if only an AI is in the room.
AIs work based on set Datas, so if an unexpected medical condition appears, it
may give inaccurate results. Therefore, the job requires a professional, trustworthy
person like an optometrist to supervise the AI at all times. While working on my
capstone, something I learned about myself is that I am a person who likes
planning set schedules to manage my time wisely. Throughout the few months that
we were given to work on our capstones, I made a schedule that specifically said
what part of my capstone I should have finished by the end of each week. In most
parts, I was able to work based on that schedule, which helped me complete my
capstone a month earlier than its due date. From this experience, I learned that I
work well with having set schedules and that having schedules keeps me motivated
and on track.   
 
 
The project I created is relevant to me because I am planning on pursuing a career
in optometry in the future. I learned so much about the job while shadowing my
optometrist and observing everything. I was able to see what a workday of an
optometrist looks like, what they do in between appointments, the machines that
are used and what they are for. The little details of the job that I discovered helped
me gain so much information that I was not aware of before. Now I am even more
motivated to pursue a career in Optometry.  
 
 
Out of the six Core Competencies, I demonstrated my communication skills when I
reached out to my optometrist politely and respectfully. Before I started my
capstone, I emailed my optometrist explaining what my plan was for my capstone
and if I could shadow him. Once he replied saying yes, I communicated about how
many times and hours a week I was planning on spending and expressed how
thankful I was for the opportunity. I also used my creative thinking skills to plan
out what to say for my podcast and how to divide up certain topics in each of the
podcasts. I tried to be creative with the scripts so that the podcast would be very
informative but not too boring to listen to.  
 
 
 Although my capstone project may not have had an impact on the community, it
had a huge impact on me. By doing my capstone project based on this topic, not
only have I learned deeply about the career of an Optometrist, but I have also
formed a good relationship with my optometrist. My optometrist has told me that if
I need any more shadowing opportunities before applying to Optometry Schools, I
can reach out to him. From doing my capstone project, I feel like I am one step
closer to success.   
 
 
 Iam extremely proud of the way that my podcast as a whole turned out. When I
was planning out my podcasts, I was worried that my podcast would be too boring
as it is just me talking. To avoid that boredom, I purposely made it so that none of
my podcasts would be over 5 minutes each. However, after I finished making all
my podcasts, I thought that making each episode so short would look like I did not
put in enough effort. But that thought changed when my parents listened to my
podcasts and said that the short, informative podcasts helped them keep focused on
what I was talking about. After getting that feedback from them, I was relieved and
started to be very proud of my final product. 
 
 
A difficulty that I encountered was that around April, I went through a very hard
time in my life. Due to that, I was unable to work on my capstone for a whole
week and fell behind the schedule that I set. Although I knew that I was not on
time with my schedule, I let myself take a break that week because I did not want
to stress myself out even more than I was already at that time. I overcame this
difficulty by starting to go to school again the following week, and quickly
catching up on everything that I missed the previous week, including my capstone
shadowing hours.   
 
 
For my podcast, I wish I could have asked my optometrist to share a story of
something interesting that happened at the job to include in the podcast, just to mix
in a bit of fun. My podcast is very informative as it talks about certain medical
conditions that can be spotted, what a day in the life of an optometrist looks like,
and the names of machines used by an optometrist. However, it did not have any
fun stories that would keep the listeners intrigued. If I had a chance to change one
thing in my podcast, it would be to add a bit more stories.   
 
 
The advice I would give to a student who will be working on their capstone next
year would be to make a set schedule like mine to keep track of everything. I think
that since there is so much time given to finish the Capstone project, a lot of people
have pushed off working on it until the last few weeks. I have seen a lot of my
friends struggling to finish their capstone before the deadline because they didn’t
put much focus on their capstone in the first few months. Setting a schedule like
me helps finish everything on time, or even earlier because it’s like having a
constant reminder to work on the capstone project.   
 
 
My optometrist was my biggest source for my research. The information that he
gave out was all based on personal experience and knowledge that he built up
during his whole career, making them very trustworthy. When I showed him my
annotated bibliography which had many different data from different perspectives,
he was able to point out certain things from each website that were not exactly
accurate. This helped my podcast, the main part of my capstone, be full of accurate
information.