Many students at my school, including myself, find the process of purchasing school books stressful because their families cannot afford to buy their books from my school’s overpriced bookstore. This summer, to raise awareness about this issue and equalize the book purchasing process, I created an e-commerce platform exclusively for my school community called Hawken Auction where students and alumni can buy and sell their books at discounted prices.

See the website here: https://www.hawkenauction.com/

During the summer of 2021 I was Selected for the advanced cohort where I worked with Google engineers for 4 weeks to create projects using html, CSS, java script, and firebase. For my group’s final project, we created a website that allowed users to log-in with their google accounts and create an interactive music rankings list. In this project, I was responsible for the styling and colorization using CSS in addition to the page layout using HTML and Javascript. The experience also gave me an introduction to database management using firebase. Watch the video for a demo!

See the website here: my-music-mix.web.app/ and the Github repo here: https://github.com/twilkhoo/My-Music-Mix

During the 2022-2023 school year I worked as a research assistant in the Computational Design Lab at Columbia University. There, I worked on developing, testing, and writing for our paper focued on using generative AI for science communication. You can read the paper on arxiv here. Below is a video of our PI presenting our paper for the ICCC '23 confrence!

During the 2022-2023 school year I worked as a research assistant in the Computer Enabled Abilities Lab at Columbia University. There, I worked on developing, testing, and writing for our paper focued on using spatialized audio to improve spatial awareness and collaboration for Blind and Visually Impaired people using desktop screen readers. We have created a paper and an extended abstract that have been submitted to confreces due for publication in 2024. Stay tuned for results!

During summer 2020 I participated in the summer academic phase of the MIT Online Science, technology, and Engineering Community. On August 11th, 2020 I presented my final academic phase project for my Machine Learning course. My group and I created an AI friend who can help you based on the emotions in your face. We created our non-binary friend in python using convolutional-neural-networks. See the presentation to learn more and watch the demo to see (Ai)ly in action!

Summer 2020 I received a full scholarship to participate in Pioneer Academics, the world's only online undergraduate level research program for high school students that provides college credit to top tier colleges. I studied predictive analytics under the mentorship of Anasse Bari, the Assistant Director of Computer Science at New York University. I worked with Professor Bari for four months and wrote a research paper on unsupervised learning models after learning machine learning algorithms like kmeans, kmeans++, KNN, and hierarchical clustering. I also learned how to use R programming, Rapid Miner, and Weaka as data mining tools.

I received an A grade on the paper, earning two college credits and a ranking as a member of the top 10% of students from Professor Bari's Pioneer Classes. Read the paper below:

Summer 2020 I received another scholarship to participate in Pioneer Academics, the world's only online undergraduate level research program for high school students that provides college credit to top tier colleges. I studied digital mapping under the mentorship of Professor Jakub Kabala, the digital studies at Davidson College. I worked with Professor Kabala for five months and learned how to do spatial analysis using Mathematica. After learning the basics, I was able to choose my own research area that combined digital mapping with another topic. I chose to use spatial analysis to understand the relationship between the relationships with and proximity to cultural institutions and how it affects the quality of education in Ohio schools. To complete this project, I created over five unique maps of Cuyahoga County school districts, specialized by data like school state report cards, income levels, and more.

My hard work earned an A from my professor and a glowing recommendation from Mr. Kabbala. He deemed me one of the top 5% of students he’s ever worked with at Pioneer, calling me a “sensitive and impressive data analyst”. Read his recommendation here and check out my paper below:

Summer 2019 I completed over 180 hours of work on a research project where I studied the effects of gamification on computer science education. Tasked with the project of making computer science courses more fun and easier to understand, I researched ways gamification can be applied to the classroom. Using this knowledge, I redeveloped the curriculum of a game design summer camp for kids hosted at the college, and used a test and control group to understand how the gamified curriculum impacted the students ability and motivation for learning. To see the promising results, expand my research poster below!

This project earned me a prize at my school’s 2019 STEM Symposium, and I was selected to present at the 2020 Northeast Ohio Science and Engineering Fair before it was cancelled due to coronavirus.

During the academic phase of the MIT Online Science, technology, and Engineering Community (MOSTEC) this summer, I also participated in the science writing course. In the class, I was given two weeks to interview experts on a scientific topic of my choice and write an article about it. My article was about the intersection between artificial intelligence and augmented reality and how the two technologies can revolutionize the health care sector. Out of many students, I was one of the few selected to have my work featured in the Best of MOSTEC 2020 e-publication. Click the link to see the full publication (see page 82), or see the box below to view my full article:

During the academic phase of the MIT Online Science, technology, and Engineering Community (MOSTEC) this summer, I also participated in the science writing course. In the class, I was given two weeks to interview experts on a scientific topic of my choice and write an article about it. My article was about the intersection between artificial intelligence and augmented reality and how the two technologies can revolutionize the health care sector. Out of many students, I was one of the few selected to have my work featured in the Best of MOSTEC 2020 e-publication. Click the link to see the full publication (see page 82), or see the box below to view my full article: