Problem Statement: What was our goal? | Part 1: For senior college night, in partnerships we created a realistic Net Price Calculator for "fake students". Part 2: We created calculators where, if you enter the cost for a single year, you find out:
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Me and Pablo's Process | Part 1: At the start of this little project we were going to present at College Night to the parents if my peers, I didn't completely understand what Kirby wanted from us when we created the spreadsheet. It took many clarifying questions and Pablo and I basically taught ourselves what we had to do. Towards last work days for the Net Price Calculator, we had an efficient system to calculate the total cost for the various colleges. Part 2: Much like Part 1, towards the beginning of Part 2 Pablo and I just tried to solve for the solution on our own. At first my goal was to solve it with out Kirby, but with Kirby's help explanation of the PMT function, we inputted the correct function. Part 3: For these individual presentations we had to create a presentation for our parents solely focused on the cost of college. It was personalized! I inputted how much my parents and myself would have to pay in loans if we took out a 10 year loan. I preferably would want to take out a 10 year loan but I included a 25 year loan as well. | |
Solution | Part 1: The "solution" for the Net Price Calculator was just the completed spreadsheet with the various information filled out for each individual fake student. Part 2: For the loan payment calculator, the PMT function to me was the solution, because that function is what changes the numbers in the calculator. Part 3: Final graph of 2 compared paths | |
Problem Evaluation | Part 1: I think this mini project was more helpful for the parents than it was for us. Actually we basically did the project for College Night although it was a simple task and question we most likely could have answered on our own for our parents in approximately 2 minutes. In all honesty, when Kirby brought up the topic we were going to be working on for the semester, I thought it was going to be useful for us, the students. Part 2: It is the second part of the Cost of College 2015 project, and personally I still haven't found it much helpful. We created a calculator, but we need critical information that not all of have for the calculator to be fully functioning with no flaws. I'm no sure about my other peers but I haven't figured it out yet. I don't find it much help for my financial needs, unfortunately I feel as if we are working on it just because we need something to do for an hour during math. |
Self Assesment | Part 1: I think the quality of a mathematician I most grew in Growth Mindset/Perseverance. I've noticed that in not just math, I try my best to understand the purpose of our work with the help of my peers. Sometimes I never grasp the real meaning as of why we are doing what we are doing and that's okay. Other times I just don't agree with what we are spending our time on and that's okay also. I believe I grew in a sense of realizing those things. Part 2: I have experienced growth in Collaboration, not only as a mathematician, but also in all of my other classes. I am starting to miss having the commons for math since we had the luxury to write our thoughts all over the whiteboards. I enjoyed standing with my peers jotting down our ideas and questions. It was interesting working with just my partner, but also having the resource of all my peers. My collaboration skills just continue developing. Part 3: I'd give myself an A for always meeting deadlines and being on top of it. I did genuine work. The area I grew in the most was My parents were impressed with how I figured out the 10 year loans and the 25 year loans. They didn't really ask how I got those numbers because they looked promising. Neither of them needed to ask much anyway since I explained the college loan calculator to them. The only question my dad asked was why my monthly payments are way lower than theirs, I just mentioned that I would barely have an income if I had one at all during the time I need to pay my loans. When I presented to my mom the last college I was considering, which is my first choice, she cringed at the monthly payment. I don't blame her I did too when I first saw it. I reminded her that it was if we had to take a loan out for the entire cost, so not considering any scholarships. I hope I get a few scholarships. After the presentation I told my dad the price for Cal Poly Pomona was high for our family because college is not cheap. He reminded me that you don't have to stick with the payments, you can pay them off at any time, and that the monthly payments are only for our convenience. Link to Cost Of College Presentation! https://docs.google.com/a/hightechhigh.org/presentation/d/1pXyldu2iH18mURJ4tuKnFz5o4D1PvHo3PT7ASdo5y_w/edit?usp=sharing |