October 21, 2025 Week 7 Learning Journal

October 21, 2025

Week 7 Learning Journal (15-30 Minutes)

Part One

Reflect on your team's Final Research Video Project Planning.  How did you collaborate?  What tools did you use to communicate and produce? Is the process smooth, what will you do differently next time in large collaborative projects?

In CST349 this week we are collaborating a lot as a team. Ashley, Alexander, Lee and I have met twice to first go over the project (Sunday), and then to check in on progress (Tuesday). We have collaborated over Discord and Zoom using Google Slides and Google docs to organize. I made a Google doc with an outline and script pre Sunday meet to keep flow and theme, then we all worked in Google slides Sunday to go over color and font and talk about the plan to complete. Alexander has volunteered to put the project together in Premiere Pro, he showed a demo Tuesday and it looks great. We are all collecting visuals and audio for our sections. 

Our biggest challenge was Bryan being missing for a long time. He did get on Discord Tuesday but was not able to attend the meeting. As of right now we are moving forward without him to get the project completed. I'm not sure if he will contribute anything, I hope he does as he is a nice guy and has done good work in the past. In the future I think we will use the skills we are learning this time around. We effectively assessed the situation and everyone took on the extra load of work to get the project done. This will also come in handy if any one of us has an emergency in the future. Our team has proven to be well balanced and adapts easily to dilemmas. 

Part Two

Please reflect on the Lecture readings in this section and what you have learned from this week's activities.

The Harvard podcast showed the ethical and social dilemmas of AI. Even though they think AI is an engine of uncertainty and innovation, it has had a tremendous benefit to restoring archival footage and photographs. They emphasized how people invest heavily in the acceleration of AI technology but don't think about oversight. The speakers think we need more regulation and monitoring systems. 

One other takeaway is that developers need to embed ethics into their design and education models. The current pace is to let it loose and then think about ethics later once AI has done or said something unacceptable. They also point out humility and observation. It struck me, as a future developer (I hope), that I need to refocus occasionally on how what I'm doing will impact the world. 

Review ted.com video reflections

I watched a Ted talk on AI and protein engineering. It was pretty complex but AI is helping transform protein engineering and is improving success by 10-20%. Scientists see AI as a creative partner and want to use it to explore untapped areas of biological sciences. They think AI will only enhance creativity, not replace it. 

As a future software engineer, reflect on the Harvard Podcast on AI's Perils and Promises 

As a future software engineer I really got the feeling to check my work and make sure I'm doing something that matters. I have this unique opportunity to make a difference because this degree is my path to teach, I already have a full time career. I have a chance to learn real skills and make a difference. The Harvard presentation opened my eyes to the dangers of what's going on in the world of tech. One of my side projects is actually a dashboard for AI safety developers can integrate into their models to flag harmful reactions from the AI. Hopefully this is something I will be able to expand on in the future. 

Presentation skills reading/video
This one was pretty funny but he did have a lot of useful ideas to teach. It taught to not put all the words on the slide, use it more like a note care. Keep the font normal and don't have spinning text. Don't put too many bullet points. Use charts to clarify info, don't use a lot of charts. Avoid acronyms. Don't use default font or super fancy font, find something normal. I think we used a lot of these ideas in out video. I'm confident that we did ok, these videos definitely helped the outcome.