Description
The Power Privilege and the Purse project was a collaboration of the Juniors at High Tech High North County where we focused in on important socioeconomic issues that currently affect our lives, the community, and the country. There were many different subjects that were researched and discussed throughout the project that included Islamophobia in America, women in the workplace, and wage inequalities tied into race disparities. The events leading up to the final exhibition of this project was analyzing wages and taxes along with statistics involving payouts to women and people of color to see if there were any marginal differences between other communities. We also analyzed statistics to see the correlation of college degrees and wages. The end product was a symposium put together by the entire Junior year at High Tech High North County where we presented everything we learned and observed in front of a large audience at the Vista Community Clinic.
Process
When it comes to socioeconomic issues, you can not simply formulate a solid position on something without first doing research and then doing the math to make all of the research come together. The first thing we did was formulate financial plans as if we were making a set salary per year. This took in account all taxes, food, recreational spending, and a three bucket method planning system where we had to calculate the proper amount of money to invest, save, and spend given the salary of our aspiring career. Then we had to make a financial plan as if we made minimum wage, which was a lot harder to budget out. Throughout the course of the project, we also created different types of graphs and info graphics to back up our claims and properly illustrate the findings of our research. Along with the research, we needed ways to calculate taxes and other fees correctly to properly budget out our financial plans, so throughout the project, we learned all about compound interest and simple interest as well as a variety of equations to help us calculate everything that we needed to know.
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Deeper Learning
Something that I learned about taxes and budgeting that I can take away is how to use mathematical modeling and equations to make financial decisions. We did this by graphing out our income based on different scenarios in which we could accumulate interest from the bank and then we divided up the money into the three bucket savings system from there. Something that I learned about logarithms is that they can be very helpful in terms of using them to calculate exponential growth and decay over a period of time. During the project, we had to create info-graphics in order to visualize the statistics that we gathered during our research on a certain topic. One way I used this new found information was to question the current systems that we have in play and help formulate an opinion on how to change it so that it can benefit everyone.
"Mind the Gap" Exhibition
During the exhibition, my job was to merely hand out drinks and stand at a door when a panel was in session and to make sure there no interruptions. This may not seem like a huge contribution, but believe as a fundraiser, I saw my fair share of work well before the symposium. We, as fundraisers, were tasked by gathering food and funds. While we didn't particularly excel at the funds part, we did a nice job in terms of food. We managed to get Chick Fil A to donate some sandwiches as well as Pannikin Coffee and Tea to donate some of their delicious coffee among many other things. In my eyes, the exhibition was a huge success we were able to have the panels say all they wanted to and deliver their message on their respective topics to many members of the community.
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