The need for reform at West Orange

A detailed plan for the immediate next 4 years, its execution, and implementation
As seen by a sophomore

It has been a little over 2 years for me at West Orange and I cant bear to see any more of the
problems at this school. Literally, this (along with many public schools across the globe)
school has so many issues that can be resolved that I feel the need to write an extensive
essay exposing them. Most of the issues are not even governmental issues like the whole
curriculum system and Common Core, but rather problems that Warriors have created
themselves and can be fixed. It is sad that I NEED to expose problems with the school. I
believe West Orange has always been ahead of the curve and more advanced than many of
its counterparts, but unless the new principal does anything other than create a YouTube
channel to showcase our terrible WOW TV footage, the next immediate 4 years are going to
be rough. Why 4 years? That is how long a generation at West Orange generally lasts (and if it
lasts longer, its probably because West Orange doesnt know what it is doing to its kids), and
this is how long it will take them to judge Mr. Sczinski. As a man who has been described as
innovative and here to change West Orange technologically, I believe he could do more in a
week with a selected team at West Orange and a thorough plan than he has done in his
roughly 8 months at West Orange acting as the Principal and even more time preparing for
the transition during the summer. However, I am not here to bash the man with so much
power. I am here to help him. I am here to suggest how to fix West Orange, and I absolutely
cant do that without him. Mr. Sczinski, grab a highlighter, Im about to take you through all of
our problems, in no specific order except the one that my mind devises on this early Sunday
morning. If you get bored reading this, try reading it in Lightning Linehans voice. Thats the
voice I am writing in. It will keep me awake through the essay. Enjoy, and please, fix this
school.

Abridged list of issues

1. WOW TV
2. WOHS website
3. WOHS mobile app
4. WOHS social media outlets
5. Class resource distribution fragmentation/digitalization
6. Progressbook
7. Attendance fragmentation/inefficiency
8. Lunch distribution/retail
9. Teacher evaluations
10.Dress code and weapons checking
11.Bathroom policies/planners
12.Library rules, uses, reorganization
13.Curriculum fragmentation among identical courses
14.Need for strict, justified grading rubrics
15.Bus system
16.Car parking system
17.Fund deployment priorities
18.Vending machines
19.Disciplinary policies (and their fragmentations)
20.The new ID system

Im sure Ive missed a lot of other problems as well, but this is pretty much top priority right now.
Maybe Ill write another reformation paper within my next 2 years here at WOHS, but the hope is
that after resolving these intermediate issues, the others will quickly unravel and fix themselves
independently. I have very little involvement internally at WOHS so I am not knowledgeable of
many of our other ventures (I did not even know we had a school wide publication until earlier this
year), but if I did I am confident I could find faults in each of those as well). Lets begin with one of
my favorite rants, a heavy WOHS resource drain and useless venture for now, WOW TV.

WOW TV
Daily, Monday to Friday, during the beginning of 2 nd period, lasting an undefined amount of time, is
a superfluous show broadcasted in what seems to be 480p resolution (which looks good on a
smartphone from 2007, not an 80 inch projection) across the whole campus. If the show had
slightly better production value, maybe I wouldnt even be as mad about it as I am right now. If I
had a 10 year old cousin, he would compile a better show in iMovie than the garbage that is
produced by the TV production crew that uses what seems to be professional tools and equipment.
It is not a crazy prediction to make that nearly $1K is spent on WOW TV yearly. I dont watch WOW
TV anymore. It is useless. Nearly anything that comes out of the anchors mouth is either outdated,
repetitive, or way too complex to understand. News needs to be quick, concise, and simple. 90
seconds. Thats it. Thats all I ask for, you can fit ALL of the news in that much time if you just take
out the useless info or the cheesy dialogue. STOP FILMING IT LIVE. The anchors are terrible, the
scripts are all days old anyway, and no information presented during WOW TV is breaking news.
NOTHING said during that show is dynamic, and filming it live or the day before with rehearsed
recordings and outtakes makes ZERO difference. Honestly, if we didnt film WOW TV live, maybe
our anchors wouldnt be laughing when they try to persuade us not to use the word retard
anymore. How unprofessional. The truth is that WOW TV is a sad, dry show that has long outlived
its usefulness in its current form and seems to be run by idiots. There are countless audio and
video problems, the whole system seems to be running on decade old Macs or something. Videos
about anti-bullying are shown and they are of terrible quality (no surprise there), I dont even know
how WOW TV is distributed throughout the school but it is beyond evident by now that the current
method is a disaster. There are pseudo green screen effects and terrible lighting errors everywhere,
the mics are awful and there is no closed captioning. Heres some random guy with sports, he will
read an extremely long monologue that is way too specific about whatever happened last night and
he will only spend about 2 seconds actually telling you the scores and stuff that matters. Heres
another random dude with the weather which is actually often inaccurate and goes into too much
detail about the exact percentage of expected precipitation for tomorrow. Last but not least,
heres some spiffy-looking guy who is going to debate for 5 minutes and try to convince us to
legalize weed. Ha-ha just kidding the show isnt over apparently we are having technical
difficulties, so we will just show you a video about teen suicide now. Go ahead play the video from
YouTube now. Now that thats over, lets INTERVIEW a REPORTER for the Sochi Olympics and ask
him some of the most terrible questions only a 70 year old Journalism teacher could suggest. A
pattern is emerging here, WOW TV is a waste of time, money, and other resources. Often times
than not, an episode is basically made up of a monotone anchor reading verbatim a boring
manuscript that is ALSO put up on the screen for US to read. Dont worry, you can fix it. Look, the
key is chronology. Place the generic topics first then get into specifics. I want to hear whats for
lunch today, is it going to rain soon, tell me if any classes are meeting in the media center or
something today, tell me anything else that affects the whole school, like possibly an assembly.
Follow up with extra info. At that point, the people that needed to hear important news have heard
it. Now its time for you to notify me of sports SCORES (I do not care that Susie Parker made a
diving goal at 7:55 PM EST, no one does, if they did then they wouldve seen the game), tell me
about any potential club meetings AND WHERE AND WHEN they are, do not try to break the ice
using a cheesy dialogue. I just want the info, quickly and seamlessly, then get back to work. I want

it in HD, 24 FPS, with a scrolling news ticker, clear audio, and closed captioning. I also dont want to
see boring anchors with their hands crossed over a roundtable sitting in front of a large portrait of
the sky. I want this all in 90 seconds daily, prerecorded and distributed via the local server that
every teachers computer is connected to or even the WOHS secure intranet, daily. These are the
basic aspects of WOW TV that need to be changed in order to make it look and feel as of higher
quality, as well as for it to DELIVER high quality, useful and curated content that generalizes itself
to appeal to all 3000 or so of its viewers. WOW TV is a crucial component of the technology
overhaul that needs to happen at WOHS. Due to this, special attention should be paid at what the
TV Production team actually does and what they need to change. Expected time for this transition
to occur should be less than a few weeks.

1. Hawaii? In a weird gradient spectrum and ugly font? What purpose does this serve? How does
this have anything to do with news? Anything? The bokeh effect underneath that? A 5 th grader
could design better visual effects than this.
2. Having the time displayed is acceptable, but having it displayed in a super bright white placed
upon a super bright blue is unreadable, especially from the optimal 10 foot distance that most
audiences of WOW TV view it from in the class.
3. No one cares that it is live, and it shouldnt be live. Above the live indicator, there are two
palm trees that also serve zero purpose towards WOW TV. Sure, the theme is spring break I
guess, then whats up with all the tropical stuff? Wait, I remember the spring break themed CNN
newscasts. Just kidding, they dont exist, and they dont NEED to.
4. Dishonest body language. Its too artificially formal and proves to be comical once the
monotonous anchor opens her mouth and tells us irrelevant information.
5. Clutter. A piece of paper. Directly contradicts the reality of the anchors dialogues being read
word for word off of a Keynote presentation that is simultaneously displayed to the viewer. Its
unprofessional and even more dishonest than crossing your hands.
6. Cheap fake backdrop of a tree, HILARIOUSLY contradicts the magical palm trees floating in the
clouds. Why not just film the show outdoors in favorable weather conditions and controlled
audio? It would look GREAT.
7. Black bars on the side? Wake up, we dont have square TVs or square phones to watch WOW TV
on. It can be argued that projector drop downs are square, but that argument is immediately
invalidated by the fact that a wide screen experience (21:9 ratio preferably) would allow more
information to fit in a single frame and look less cluttered than the current WOW TV format.
Efficient, quick, spontaneous, and clever.

1. Is this really the WOW TV logo? Please tell me this is a joke. This is an insult to West Orange.
2. Cant read that.
3. I dont even want to know what that is, but if I cant tell what it is at first glance, then you did
your job wrong.
4. As a general rule, if I can watch WOW TV with my audio off and gain no less information than I
would with audio on, theres a problem.

1. Room 953 or the M.C (lots of people wont even know this is the media center)? Which one do I
go to donate items? Are they the same room?
2. Just, why? By including what seems to be Microsoft Office clip art, you are just degrading the
quality of WOW TV even further.
3. The anchor says K.I.S.S. lasts until March 31 st yet the words say today. What does that mean?
When is the deadline? Does today even signify a deadline?

1. This is why
you dont film live, so you dont have technical difficulties like this. Another anchor is in the
middle of talking and the camera transitions to the other anchor fixing her hair. Classy.

1. Again, totally unreadable.

2. On paper this looks readable. On a 72 DPI projector (like in all classes), you would need
binoculars to see this. Furthermore, its just the script the anchors are saying.
3. So in the last few pictures, this logo was replaced by a weird, different logo. The fact that there
are continuity errors as such is terrible.
4. Already, this show has lasted at least 3 minutes. Far too long for a daily morning segment.
5. There is the WOW TV logo again. The fact that it appears and disappears in an unorderly
fashion contributes to the low quality show overall.

1. Immediately following the pie contest, I expected the show to be over. All the humor is over so
fittingly it wasnt an unreasonable expectation. However, the show continues and with MORE
NEWS. This is what I mean when I suggest the show needs to pay attention to chronology. Not
everyone wants to see a pie contest but they NEED to hear about the news. Instead of having
to wait another few minutes for more news to be said, why not save the entertainment for
last and deliver the content that is crucial to warriors?

1. If this is the WOW TV logo, what was the other logo often displayed in the bottom right corner?
Also, the typographical aspects of this logo, the colors, the iconography and symbolism it tries
to portray is awful.
2. WOW TV is not a trademark. Stop lying and trying to look hip and professional.
3. Whats up with the Hawaii obsession at WOW TV? This is Florida.

It needs to be noted that the picture analysis is of only 2 episodes, yet nothing remains changed
throughout all the other episodes. In fact, sometimes there are even more continuity errors. Often,
that WOW TV logo never even appears at the end of many episodes. Sometimes, the intro video (also
terrible) doesnt appear on multiple episodes either. Credited songs arent even correct sometimes!
Other anchors can be heard giggling while the speaking anchor tries to read their lines. Off camera
videos need to be loaded up and queued from a computer and it looks terrible and takes too much
time to initiate. If the show werent live, maybe kids would actually have something to do during their
TV Production class, and they might not miss the first few minutes of 2 nd period. The timeslot for WOW
TV is awful as well, if you are going to have morning announcements over the PA system, why not just
host WOW TV in that much time? 90 seconds (this is getting repetitive)? Honestly it wouldnt hurt to
have some humor in WOW TV either, I would love to see that. Id even write the scripts for the daily
show if I ever got the chance to do so. It could be something awesome.
Every time I see the credits roll in an ugly sans-serif font, I dont see a list of people that should be
credited for anything. I see a list of people that should read this analysis and drastically transform
WOW TV.

WOHS website
I had lots of fun with this topic, there is just so much to talk about thats wrong with our website. Lets
start with a basic analysis of the horrible homepage.

The first impression of West Orange to a new visitor is this website. Its an awful impression to give. A
cluttered cluster of bad color choices, skeumorphism, horrible typography, and sheer uselessness, the
website is at its worst now than ever before.
1. What is this mysterious icon? A file explorer? A sitemap? A CDN directory for the WOHS
website? What year is this? 2002? This button has no functional advantage to any normal
human being that visits this website.
2. Theres multiple 2s on the picture above for a reason. Can you tell this is an OCPS school
website? Thanks to the bombardment of ugly branding, I sure can. I do not know how this helps
me in anyway, but it sure does remind me of the bumper stickers on cars. Its basically like
advertising without a purpose.
3. If 3rd party widgets can get any uglier than this, I might have to turn off my computer and cry.
Ok, I get it, we have a large hispanic demographic at the school that needs a Spanish version of

4.
5.
6.

7.
8.

the website (if they even need to use the website for some absurd reason), but does the
translator widget have to be so ugly? Represents a beige box of doom from the 90s rather than
a translator widget.
Multiple 4s!! More branding! I didnt know I was on the WOHS website before I saw these logos!
Thanks for reminding me. By the way, that banner at the right of the translator widget is
capable of giving a dyslexic person multiple seizures.
This search widget is awful. Does not work and should be fixed immediately. When I say does
not work, I FLAT OUT MEAN it is nonfunctional. Typing in a query then pressing search results in
a refresh of the page. WOW.
This is 2014. You do not need to write Click here for someone to know this is a link. People are
internet adept by now, perhaps the WOHS website designers are not. I take that back, not
perhaps, most definitely inept in design. Right next to the senior calendar link is ANOTHER
calendar. 2 calendars? No uniformity, it looks like all the content on this website was literally
pulled off of real documents and scrunched together into a sorry excuse for a website.
A home button! Why? Arent I already at the home page?? How much more HOME can I get?
If your website needs a help button, you failed intuitiveness. Epicly.

1. Once I zoomed out on the page, I immediately noticed just how static this website is. The WOHS
website needs to be made in accordance to a liquid layout, one where all elements on the page
dynamically adjust in size and shape according to the screen size and PPI of the user so white
space like this isnt left off. Plus, its a gradient, and gradients represent a web era from the
past.
2. Speaking of PPI, no human with normal eyes can read that banner. The text is so miniscule even
when zoomed in to normal size. Sadly, even if someone zoomed in on the website even further,
they would not be able to read the banner because of the negligence of SVG here. A SVG
banner would allow lossless zooming and therefore would enable users to read the banner
comfortably.
3. The contact number for Ed Jones is provided, but no other administrator. The NUMBER is
provided, yet no other form of communication. Wait, I forgot this website was made in an era
where E-Mail does not exist.
4. Instead of directing us to a bazillion social media outlets for news, why not perfect your website
first and put it on par with the outlets so that anything else is just a bonus? Besides, those social
media outlet icons are ugly, and Im pretty sure Apple discontinued that logo back when they
decided to drop the Computer from their corporate name. Same for that Twitter logo.

5. So much clutter. A barrage of links waiting to be clicked, with absolutely no indication or

direction to give us any supportive information on the links.

Super intimidating and frustrating to click a link and then be redirected to an error message akin to
this. My old Windows 2000 computer had a more graceful BSoD than this CDN error.

Ive been
waiting 2 years for compilation of information to occur here. Furthermore, it directs me to follow
navigation links to the left. Theres ONE link to the left and its the link that redirects me BACK to
the home page, a few hierarchical sections back in the site directory.

These are just A FEW issues I found in a few minutes. If I scoured the website even further (like you
should), I would bet my 3.99 GPA (humble brag) I would find even more problems. For the sake of
time (the fact that I have exams to study for) and length of this essay (we are on page 13 and only
on the second issue), I will refrain from inspecting the website anymore. I have seen enough.
WOHS has done enough on its part. Simply because WOHS doesnt know what more to do yet. They

need a sense of direction. A new style. Warriors need to embrace minimalism and do so bravely
and whole-heartedly. Its time for a design revolution, and clean aesthetics will lead it. Finally,
Warriors need the website that SERVES them. Its time to use the web as a utility, not a recycling
bin for paper documents. Now heres what I think a functional, beautifully modern and fully realized
school website in 2014 should look like.

Introducing cards. An interactive display of curated content, live, and versacard. Easily
customizable, liquid layout fueled by deep data repositories from within West Orange. No more
confusing links and ugly gradients, no more error messages, only cleanliness. Parsed information
from various documents formatted nicely and concisely for these context-aware cards. Through
flipping and sliding and rotating animations, each card uniquely catches attention and keeps it
locked on. The attention to whitespace and color coordination aids the user in navigation, and this
is why a help button is not needed. A simple WOHS warrior logo in the top left is a symbol of simple
branding, and next to it is an omnibox that is capable of scouring all backlinks to the main
repository. The flexible layout of the cards is partly the whole beauty in this new interface itself.
Being dynamic and effervescent is only part of the story. The iconography, typography, color
theory, whitespacing, and drop shadows all contribute to a uniform NEW look for WOHS. A look that
I am only getting started with.

This right here is the key to WOHSs newfound success in tech. A unified login system for ALL tech
services West Orange offers (more on this soon, MUCH more). The simple drop down shade is such
a strong opponent to the messy cluster of links in the original WOHS website meant to serve as
navigational tool. What is possible with this unified login system is really the truly magical part of
the website.

At its potential height, THIS is what the WOHS website can become for every student. Again back
to the repository of info WOHS has been collecting (more on this when I discuss the need for a new
ID system, we now have the power to create a truly unique and personalized experience for
students that no one can offer. After simply signing into the website, the repository was pinged with
a list of queries in chronological order. The repository KNOWS I access progressbook on a daily

basis. Consequently, it pulls up a card with my grades and places it foremost front and center
ahead of all the other content. The repository also knows I usually buy lunch, through algorithms
(which I will also write and explain when I talk about the new ID system), often. However, tomorrow
is a Tuesday. The repository knows that from my previous transactions, I most often buy lunch on
Tuesdays more than any other day. By knowing this, it categorizes the lunch menu into my daily
feed of cards and prioritizes it at the second level of abstraction within my feed, right after grades.
Next, the repository knows I missed school this Monday and therefore missed the announcement
made by my AP Chemistry teacher about our upcoming test tomorrow. The repository not only is
able to notify me of this but is capable of linking me to resources that might help me tonight when I
study. Another thing the repository knows about me is my race, Indian. Based on that, it pulls up a
translation card for Hindi (the native language). Imagine a Hispanic student logging in and being
presented with easy access to automatic Spanish translation. More functional than the previous
method used in the current website. 2 friendly countdowns remind me of important dates. Notice
how in the previous screenshot where I had not logged in, the card reminded the generic WOHS
audience when FCAT starts. Now that I have logged in, the repository knows who I am and scans
my schedule, acknowledging the fact that I have AP exams to worry about. It also scans my
previous FCAT scores and compares them to my previous AP exam scores and prioritizes which one
I need to be notified about first. Sometimes, teachers notify you of the stuff you missed in class
when the repository is unable to find out that info. In that case, you can see I received a message
from my AP World History teacher, notifying me to do my homework. If I tapped the message, I
would get more detail on what the assignment is (this time the repository has found the
assignment but not the contextual info). I can also easily reply to the message with a single tap.
Speaking of taps, one thing that became apparent is that most of the WOHS website visitor traffic
comes from mobile devices, i.e. touch display devices. This means the next evolution of the WOHS
website has to be more touch friendly, rather than cursor friendly. With the large buttons and text,
you can see how this new design is more readable and interactive with smaller screen devices
lacking a mouse and keyboard. One last thing the repository notices is my participation in the
Interact club, based on it finding my registration form in the WOHS central database. It quickly
pulls up a card for directions to the volunteering session and upon tapping it, I would be presented
with an elegant popover telling me more info e.g. time of the event.

The repository is the future, and it will fill the whole feed with an infinite amount of cards all pulled
from WOHSs databases. As far as I see, there is no adequate alternative other than the one just
suggested as a solution to the atrocity that the WOHS website is.

WOHS mobile app

Yet another piece of software at West Orange that needs to be completely redesigned: the pointless
WOHS mobile app. Nothing more than a barebones (and badly made) web wrapper around the
already terrible WOHS website (as discussed earlier). WOHS needs and deserves a native
application, NOT a cheap excuse of an app that is ported from the web. Theres a reason the app
performs so poorly and has slow response times is because of this. Its a website posing as an app.
I was expecting the app to be of MUCH higher quality than WOHSs previous experiments with
designing software since someone from the outside would be commissioned to work on this project.
Little did I know that WOHS would hire the most incapable man for the job, Eyad Allhainey or
whatever? Qualifications: None that prove him to have the caliber to work on a mobile application
for a high school. Time for an analysis of the work he has done.

1. This icon is terrible. Its basically the Warrior head on top of an orange gradient. Right when
WOHS needs to rebrand itself, this app counteracts our strategy with this inconsistent piece of
trash.
2. If a web wrapper application requires the latest version of iOS to run, that is just sad. No new
developmental features of iOS 7 (Like the SpriteKit, updated CoreAnimations, or even the new
design language) are implemented into this app. Upon closer inspection, this app could run fine
on a device with iOS 2 considering how basic and simple the native elements of the app are
(consisting of just UIButton elements everywhere).
3. WOHS support. Click it. Where does it take me? Surely to a page where I can quickly type out
my issue or speak to someone appropriate about it right? How about this:

Eyads portfolio is apparently the WOHS support link. You know you screwed up when your app
developer has a banner on his site showcasing the fact that he can design iOS apps for websites.
Now for fun, lets humiliate him and analyze his website too.

1.
2.
3.
4.

Doesnt know how to use spellcheck.

Is a liar, and has bad grammar.
Distorted our warrior head. We trust HIM with our app?
This shouldve given off some red flags. Since when did we recruit WEB DESIGNERS to do the
job of APPLICATION DESIGNERS?

Now lets analyze the actual application, purely from screenshots

Right off the bat, the first impression I get is a distorted Warrior head and no attention to
typography whatsoever. As stressed before, typography is a major aspect of design and that is
simply lacking here. Furthermore, the fact that I even SEE this launch image on startup tells me the
app is too slow. It should be instantaneous.

1. WOHS seriously has issues with this branding stuff. Two warrior heads ON THE SAME
SCREENSHOT. Not to mention one of them is overlaid on a linen texture that was specifically
REMOVED by Apple in iOS 7 in favor of translucency in their new design language. Linen was
introduced in iOS 4, thats a 3 year old design trend that has been obsoleted yet Eyad feels the
need to use it in the WOHS app.
2. DEPLOY NAVIGATION MENU. Is this 2001: A Space Odyssey? Or is it the instruction manual for
a spaceship? User friendly? Not at all. Especially if your content isnt intuitive enough to not
need persistent banner telling you what to do. What is the arrow for then if not an instructional
guide by itself?
3. Why does a mobile application for a school need a refresh button? A refresh button that does
absolutely nothing when pressed.

4. A back button, from the home page of the app? This is similar to that home button on the home
page of the WOHS website. Another similarity: they both shouldnt exist. Yet another addition in
the iOS design language earlier last year that Eyad missed: swiping from the left corner of the
screen to go back, if needed. Not only is a back function not needed here but it is also
implemented incorrectly.
5. I didnt download a WOHS app to see a carousel of images of the school I go to every single day.
6. Thanks for reminding me yet again that this is the WOHS app. I had no idea what I was doing
when I downloaded this app.
Thats pretty much all there is to the iPhone application. Lets see how Eyad has taken advantage
of a 9.7 canvas to expand the WOHS app i.e. the iPad version of the application. Surely he mustve
optimized it somehow, right?

No surprise here. Every single thing is just blown up to full size here. No comment. Hey, at least I
can see more of the second warrior head, right? Lets actually tap the arrow and deploy the

navigation menu to see what happens.

More links. None of these actually led to a natively coded page within the app, but all lead to a
UIWebView included in the iOS SDK. In fact, they all led to a webpage. Any guesses? The WOHS
website. To stay classy, the very last link is actually the actual Official Website of WOHS. Then what
is the first link which says homepage? Will it take me back to the homepage of the app? Wasnt
that what the back button does? Or will it take me to the WOHS website homepage? I should
probably think about the choice I make carefully since it takes forever to load a link once you tap it.
Thats awful. Eyad is an awful programmer and even more awful designer. Dont worry, just like the
previous issues I have given suggestions to for resolution, I have a solution to this problem as well.
A card based, repository driven, native mobile application. Isnt that just a web wrapper? NO. Using
native Apple technologies and the WOHS repository, we can craft an amazing experience that
shares the same DESIGN language as the NEW WOHS website, therefore on paper it may sound like
a web wrapper. In reality, it is a wildly different experience. The fact that we can use native
technologies just makes the experience that much better for the user. Heres how it could look if we
just pull ourselves together and work.

Again following the whole cards moniker, here we have a STACK of cards. The whole repository is
the DECK. From the deck, the app queues up a personalized stack based on the user that signed in.
The magical aspect of this specific screenshot is the location and time awareness that the stack
has. Using the GPS sensor in the phone, combined with the current time, the stack delivers me a
card that is of top priority: paying my lunch. The phone effectively recognized I was inside the
WOHS Cafeterias geofence and matched the current time with my schedule and realized I was
there for lunch. Of course you noticed that it says Tap to pay for lunch. I will discuss what enables
the app to use NFC to do mobile payments on Android devices and what enables the app to use
location awareness + time stamping to do mobile payments on iOS devices, as well as the
payment methods that can be used and how that is set up both on the consumer and producer
side, in the latter parts of this essay. Right now, embrace the concept wholeheartedly. Accept the
ingenuity of a predictive application that is an integral part of WOHS services and realize how much
potential lies here. Once the payment is done, the card automatically goes away and will promptly
reappear whenever needed, e.g. while checking out books at the library. The first thing I am
greeted with upon opening the app is a card with my ID, ready to pay or do whatever interaction
that requires my ID at the moment. This is cool but lets take it a step further. How can we actively

respond to changes in location and time? How can we automate the process? Push notifications.

Heres how lock screen notifications can work for the WOHS app. Thanks to the new M7 chip in the
iPhone 5s, the WOHS app can run in the background remaining idle until specific parameters are
met for an action to be triggered, all while preserving battery life. Similar power conservation
features can be emulated on the Android version of the app. Now that I have shown off how
payments could work, lets see some other cards with various functionalities, all prioritized by the
app, from the deck, in the stack, in front of your fingertips.

Students can wake up to see a card telling them when they should leave their home, how traffic
conditions are, and at what time they are expected to reach school. Very handy and also provides a
level of interaction not offered by the WOHS website due to the device agnosticism. The beauty of
a native app is access to hardware level integration to offer services such as these. Powered by the
Deck and also 3rd party mapping services.

Deck crawls through librarys database to find overdue books, matches with your name and if
applicable, displays a card in your stack notifying you of the due date and whatever fines you may
owe, which can also be paid directly within the application, no physical interaction required at the
library. Powered exclusively by the Deck.

Through Deck, get instant delivery of WOW TV episodes right to your stack. Slowly, Deck learns
about your preferences and which videos you most likely watched. In the future, this helps Deck
suggest more clips from WOW TV you might enjoy and sends it to your Stack. I will discuss the AI
(and algorithms behind it) of Deck in the last topic of this essay, but we have long ways to go
before that. A few more cards

Why only make Decks extensive knowledge graph limited only to students? Since it is technically
potent enough to reach other staff members daily lives at WOHS, apply Deck to them as well. In
this case, an AP Chemistry teacher who has been waiting for a Scantron machine to be available
for use has been notified of his wishes, and has even been told where exactly the machine is, and
is even given a map of the school with the machine pinpointed! As if the AI component of Deck
couldnt be smarter, it searches its teacher repository and learns exactly what test is to be graded
and reminds the teacher. It even has the power to find out when the quarter ends and semantically
link it to the fact that this teacher is getting ready to put something in the grade book. Last but
definitely not the least, Deck lets the teacher reserve the machine as well, an action that notifies
every other teacher waiting on the machine, directly at their stack. Powered by Deck and 3 rd party
mapping services.

When I said extend to all staff members, I wasnt kidding. Here, a custodian is notified of a spill in
the main campus cafeteria. Deck even suggests what tools he should use to approach the spill. The
spill was reported through crowd sourced information at the cafeteria and sent back up to the
repository at WOHS where it was scanned by Deck. Deck even includes a mass P2P system where
one custodian can just press ignore and the alert will be sent out to the next closest custodian to
the cafe. Powered by Deck and 3rd party mapping services.

Back to the students use case scenario, probably one of the coolest and most technologically
demanding (so demanding that I have to write more in detail about this in later issues), is live bus
status tracking. Once Deck goes through the students information and finds their bus info, it then
locates where that bus is on the bus loop and notifies the student when it arrived, when it leaves,
and even the exact position on the map. The bus location mechanism will be described later in
great detail. The user can now dismiss the card from their stack by swiping it off their screen.
Something else they can do is actually act upon the card by tapping Cool or Not riding the bus
today. The latter will tell Deck more about your daily school schedule and help it correctly map out
a timeline which in return builds a stronger recommendation engine. The end goal is Deck being
able to know all your habits and help you in school. VERY similar to the Google Now service (the
whole cards philosophy was inspired by this and Microsoft Live Tiles), yet more powerful since the
scope is much smaller and more controlled.

Of course theres even a feature called glance mode, which essentially lets users see their daily
activities and chores for WOHS at a, glance. A simple pinch-out gesture emulates a semantic zoom
to expose the whole stack.

Keep in mind that on a 326 PPI display, these cards will look crisp and clear. Plus, the glance is only
for navigational purposes. The actual experience begins when the user taps a card or is prompted
with one. Also keep in mind that the actual glance screen will be populated with more cards and
categorized more intelligently. Of course on the iPad, the app will be optimized to take advantage
of the larger screen, unlike Eyads app, this app will not just blow the iPhone app to a larger size.
To conclude this issues resolution, I will demonstrate two more cards.

Fairly interesting card for people that have HOPE/Gym. Deck recognizes the location and time and
pairs it up with the students schedule and sends this card to the stack. The heart rate is only
available when users have a Nike Fuelband or a Fitbit or any fitness tracking device connected to
their phone (and as wearables begin to take off, more and more students carry these devices on
them), otherwise it just disappears. The weightlifting record is more of a self-leaderboard and

reward system that motivates users to keep lifting, basically. The laps run and speed are all funded
by the M7 chip as well as GPS in the iPhone 5s. Deck queues GPS to track how many laps have
been run, while the M7 compares that data and timestamps for each lap to calculate average
speed. Alternatively, users can select Not dressing out today which lets Deck know in advance
without pooling its resources that today is a non-dress out day. This will even help Deck put the
puzzle together and compare non-dress out data from multiple users and link it to the daily
weather. In the future then, Deck can notify HOPE coaches of days where weather conditions are
not favorable for dressing out, which they can acknowledge and in turn, Deck will notify users in
advance that today is a non-dress out day, all without the HOPE coach having to say a single word.
Speaking of coaches

Coaches can get the same data that is UPLOADED from students and have it displayed on a
leaderboard. This helps the coaches know which students they should focus on and which require
more challenging activities. As seen above, Steve is ahead of everyone else but Marissa might
need some extra help. This is all possible with Decks ability to pull data from P2P as well as push it
for a cohesive network throughout all of WOHS.

The future is not a static application that basically does what the WOHS website does, but its a
personalized extension of that. Building an infrastructure the size of Deck is surely going to take
time, however, the blueprints for success are all here. We have extremely talented people at WOHS
and Im confident that this can one day become a reality. Oh and, PLEASE make a Windows Phone
app. Id much appreciate that.

WOHS social media outlets

WOHS has always had a weak point, and that is conveying useful news in a timely fashion to the
largest potential audience. Recently, with the arrival of the new principal, WOHS has desperately
tried to fix this problem, and to some extent they have succeeded, but they still have long ways to
go. Through the use of social media outlets, WOHS news travels faster than ever before, but the
quality of news and distribution methods are very fragmented (youre going to hear me use this
word a lot).

This is bad. I understand WOHS is trying to create a variety of news sources that students can
enjoy, but the reality is that a lot of the information on these outlets is way too specific and not
curated.

Apparently we also have a school newspaper. There are just so many news sources that warriors
are having trouble keeping up. Where do I go to find out when the Interact club meeting is? Should
I hunt through the twitter timeline or watch multiple episodes of WOW TV and wait for them to tell
me? The school newspaper is obviously outdated and slow, so I dont even see a need for it
anymore unless it is exclusively for editorials, not news (which as of now, it isnt).

Then theres this. Right on the WOHS website is Warrior Cry. I didnt know what it was and didnt
really care. So I clicked it. It was a series of web-only articles on news and editorials. Then what is
The Blade for? Which should I go to? Can I subscribe to one or something like that so I have new
editions delivered right to me? Can WOHS news really be instantaneous?

Heres the YouTube page. Heres the problem: it only has WOW TV, and each of those episodes are
immediately outdated by the time they are uploaded. Each episode is far too long. What is the
hope of these videos? Do we expect students to view these if they are absent? View outdated, low
quality, long newscasts? Now these newscasts have even started to include verbal editorials (From
where Im sitting).

What is the point of a twitter account when all that happens there are links posting directly back TO
FACEBOOK? This wouldve been SLIGHTLY more acceptable if there was some additional info as to
WHAT photo was posted to Facebook so I dont have to guess and click the links to see which
pertains to me, if any.

Instead of giving us an Instagram or Facebook link to an app, just give us the download link for the
app! Also, why two instances of the same news? Why use Instagram to advertise the OCPS app??
Twitter is pointless at this point now for WOHS.

Two instances of the same news again, and a link to Warrior Cry! More news outlets! Then WOHS
tells me to SING up and get more info at Facebook.
Believe it or not, there are more problems in the way WOHS delivers news than this.

Theres the fragmentation. Theres multiple sources for WOHS news within the social media
outlets! The problem does not stop there either, the fact that some of these sources just tweet the
same news as the others creates confusion and a sense of disorganization. So how do we fix it?
If you noticed, in the mockups of the new WOHS website and WOHS app, I never really showed you
what happens when you tap/click the down arrow button once you signed in. This is what Ive
been building towards, a personalized news source. To save time, paper, and ink, Ive only created
a mockup for the personalized news source for the WOHS app. The WOHS app is just an extension
of the app, so showing you a mockup for the app will pragmatically tell you enough for how this
concept could work through other mediums. Here is how we fix news at WOHS, here is Live Feed.

The pull-down is basically a stack of new, live cards. Whats the difference between this stack and
the main stack though? This stack is exclusively for live, real-time news updates from WOHS. Deck
delivers specific cards to the Live Feed stack based on what it knows about you from the WOHS
repository and also what you tell it, using filters (explained shortly below). As you can see here,
Deck figured out I am a football fan (I actually am not but lets pretend for the sake of
demonstration), and also figured out that last night I was NOT at the game to see the score, so this
morning it briefed me with the scores of the game. It also tells me to check back for official WOW
TV video coverage of the game, which is handy when I want to know in-depth details of the game I
missed. This news mechanism is insanely cool and efficient. It hands down bests any form of news
distribution we had before because its automated and instantly helpful. There is no better way to
get a unified source of news than through the WOHS app. That statement sends a clear message to
warriors, if you want to be updated, download the app. It gives the app more purpose to actually
exist.
One of the coolest things you probably didnt notice is how there was no setup process involved
once I signed in. Deck knew what clubs I was registered to and if I play any sports. Deck can also
find me on social networking sites to learn what I like and what I dont. Once it figures out I like
technology, maybe it would stream the Robotics team competition right to my stack of cards in my
Live Feed. Of course, computers dont always understand what we want at times. For that, there is
the inclusion of filters, a dead simple way to curate news content manually.

Tapping the down arrow for the filters brings up an elegant popover with news sources. You can
see I manually selected Sports and Academics, which notifies Deck to deliver that content to
me.
Undoubtedly, this is the smartest news delivery system, and far outdoes any social media outlet
that WOHS uses.
Now its time to take the classroom to the next level: digital. While WOHS is already approaching
that level, its happening on a smaller scale and is not totally uniform yet.

Class resource distribution fragmentation/digitalization

Teachers dont like printing lots of stuff out. We dont like carrying lots of papers around. OCPS as a
whole is moving towards a digital curriculum. The whole world is beginning to do so. The problem is
that we are moving too slow and are in an initialization state, a state of fragmentation and no
universalizing standards. A state where Edmodo and Moodle coexist, and teachers not knowing
which to utilize to distribute educative resources. I have teachers using Moodle to give out
classwork and then there are teachers on Edmodo giving out classwork. Lets not forget the
traditional resource sharing service still exists, E-Mail. Some of my teachers send newsletters via EMail and some send PowerPoints as well. How many more sources do I have to look at? This is just
like the last issue I discussed, no cohesive standard for sharing information exists, school-wide. My
suggestion? Use the WOHS website/WOHS app I redesigned a few issues back. A clean, simple

influx of information can be absorbed by users if it comes categorized into one source. Of course,
Deck will do all the heavy lifting, teachers should just use the website or app to send out
assignments. Students will be pinged and accordingly assigned the work. No longer having to
check multiple social networks posing as social education networks or having to check E-Mail is a
remarkable thing. Its a fairly feasible feat. Plus, Moodle is TERRIBLY designed. It is extremely
perplex and also overwhelming, far too difficult to maneuver around and hunt for the things you
want. Any web site designed by OCPS is a terrible one, and sadly, Moodle is no exception to that
rule. Some teachers are using even more complex intranets to send over information to students,
and having them sign up for weird textbook websites and stuff of that nature. Having to remember
a dozen logins is also no fun. Edmodo is basically a ripped off version of Facebook, just slightly
rebranded. They didnt even go into the effort of optimizing the network for educative purposes,
rather its just a mass message board system with file sharing capabilities. Even PROGRESSBOOK is
used by some teachers to give homework. Web Design, a specific class, doesnt even use any
online services, everything is locally stored on the servers at WOHS and inaccessible outside of
their computers. Ironically, there is nothing about Web Design as a class that makes it web friendly.
Filters can and should also be applied to these resource distribution systems that could be built,
within the WOHS app and website. These filters would allow content to be organized in more
fashionable means. A sort of fragmentation exists within the Meta of the classroom. Classes are
stuck in the middle with decisions to go digital. Teachers either have us do assignments in class on
paper and then tests online or homework digitally. PICK ONE SIDE. Either go all in or dont explore
the unexplored. We NEED to go all digital at this point for maximum efficiency and learning to
happen at WOHS. How is digital any better than physical? Automated grading, less management
involved, instant results, and easier and quicker access to resources that doesnt require a
middleman. That is reason enough to argue digital is better. Especially as electronics invade our
lives, nearly every student will own a device capable of running the WOHS app or website at least,
removing the final barrier of entry.

Progressbook
Ill be short and simple, progressbook sucks. I understand why we still use it (its because we
seemingly have no other option), but it needs to be fixed. Firstly, progressbook is again, too
complex to work with. I just want an easy way to see my grades and know what has been changed
in each of them. I also want it to be integrated within the WOHS app so I can receive push
notifications about that latest test that got put in the grade book. Did I mention after 11:59 PM until
5 AM that Progressbook doesnt work?

Flat out, it just does NOT work. Ok, its understandable, normal people dont really check their
grades after that time, but here is the crazy part: it does not work on weekends!! Down for
maintenance, will be back up Monday 5AM. What exactly are you maintaining? A terrible website,
thats how I see it. Progressbook has so many issues and is so vague about specific grades, even
teachers have problems with it. The fact that it does not work on weekends causes many problems:
teachers cant input grades on those days. Also, I will have no idea what my grade is the weekend
before the day grades are due. So I could be failing a class inadvertently yet I would not be able to
notify my teacher because I wouldnt be notified of it either! So for quarter 3, I fail a class! All
because some idiots were maintaining a dead simple database driven website. If I didnt have to
study for my AP classes right now, I would open up Photoshop and make some quick mockups of
exactly how a more in-depth card for grades would work in the WOHS app/website, but I do have to
study, and for now, I am sure you understand what is wrong with progressbook and how it can be

fixed. At least after seeing a pattern in the resolution of the past issues, I hope you infer the
resolution for this one.

Attendance fragmentation/inefficiency
Here is a specific irritation and annoyance I face with WOHS. Teachers suck at marking people
absent. If I am not in my seat in my CST class, the teacher marks me absent. ABSENT FROM THE
CLASS. If I am present in all my 6 classes but not in my 7 th, my teacher automatically assumes I am
skipping and calls my parents. ASSUMES. There is too much guessing and inferring going on, and
no solid system to take attendance in class, especially when we have substitutes, who just call out
names and hear for a response (often times I have called out here for absent people just to see
what happens, they fell for it). IDs are a solution to this, not just any IDs, the digital IDs discussed
earlier. Deck can identify when you walk into a class and when you leave, and this should be used
to the advantage of the attendance office. Automated seat checks. How inefficient is the current
attendance system? We use PROGRESSBOOK. As discussed earlier, not the best idea to use that
service. When we have subs, they literally mark who is absent on a piece of paper and give it to a
student to be delivered to the attendance office. What about students that walk in tardy after being
marked absent? Too bad. They have to file an official absence excuse form. Another inefficient way
to keep track of attendance. My 2 week old absence excused form that I couldve easily faked has
yet to be acknowledged, and that is because of the slow attendance office workers. Literally Deck
can make those people lose their jobs, and that is what needs to happen. We dont require their
service anymore. Its crazy to think about that for a second, a day when attendance is something
teachers dont have to worry about marking. When stuff like attendance and grading papers gets
out of the way thanks to technology, something magical begins to happen, something teachers are
paid to do. Teaching happens.

Lunch distribution/retail
Lunch quality sucks at WOHS but that is out of the principals control. What IS in the control is how
this lunch is distributed and retailed. Currently, the system involves standing in a long line slowly
moving and picking up food while waiting on a slow cashier to register the food items selected and
then collect your money. The way I see it, this problem can be fixed in 2 easy ways. First way,
students pick what they want for lunch on the WOHS app and send that data over to Deck. Back in
the cafeteria, the cashiers and lunch-ladies work on assembling our orders together into a single
tray. Once we enter the cafeteria later that day for lunch, each of our devices should be pinged by
the lunch ladies, this is the signal to come and get your lunch. All transactions have already been
done when we selected food from the menu, so we just go and basically take our lunch when
pinged, hassle-free. We also will never run out of food this way. Since students pick their food early
in the morning, lunch-ladies know exactly what we need and how much is needed. Since it is just a
pick up and go system, lunch lines will either be extremely short or nonexistent. There is another
way to fix the problem, and it will fit in with our system a little bit nicer. For the past year or so, I
have been researching RFID and NFC technologies as well as investigating the M7 chip on the
iPhone 5s. I suggest that we place 2 NFC tags on every single food item sold (each tag costs only a
few cents), one general purpose long range communicator, and one short range specified read only
communicator. Here is how it would work: students would pick up their food items from the retail
area and place it on their tray. They would walk up to the cashiers area and simply PLACE their
lunch tray on a large NFC scanner plate (not really that large), where it would instantaneously ring
up a price for all items and ping it up to Deck. Deck will send the bill to your phone and you just tap
the screen to pay. People that try to steal lunch would be stopped since after passing through a
large long range NFC scanner (like in the library), the buzzer would ring and detect that the long
range NFC general purpose tag has not been nullified by the transaction managing NFC scanner.
For iOS devices, time stamping + location awareness will let Deck know which meal you paid for
and when. For Windows Phone and Android devices, tapping the device to the NFC plate will signify
a transaction has taken place. There is one demographic we left out: People without smartphones.
How do they pay for lunch? The NEW physical ID system. To keep from any spoilers for the last part

of this essay, Ill say only a little: it is very similar to the chip and pin system that Europeans use,
and it would integrate nicely within this infrastructure just described. Thats basically it. This is how
we solve the lunch problem in a cost-conscious way. If we just set up the whole system to handle
these kind of queries and requests that Deck handles, we are good to go. Also it would be nice to
get the nutritional values for the food I eat here. Yeah, even though I dont particularly enjoy WOHS
pizza, at least I will be able to purchase it fast and easy.

Teacher evaluations
The best days in class (other than days with substitutes) are days when we have teacher
evaluations. Why? The teachers all put on a masquerade and pretend they are the best, nicest
people on the planet. Its all fake. Wake up administrators, no teacher is going to act bad like
they might in their classroom when you arent there. The DUMBEST part of this all is when you
ANNOUNCE you are coming in for evaluation. Surprise evaluations wont be that much different but
they still are better than what happens now. It is hilarious to see teachers that previously never
used the 5 Part Scale, pull out that whiteboard from the depths of their closets just for evaluation
purposes. I dont even know what it would take for an administrator to recognize bad habits of a
teacher. Evaluations dont even have a purpose! Here is how we fix it, actually 2 ways possible, one
being more costly than the other. Ill start off with the cheaper way: set up students to act as sting
operators. Every few weeks, random groups of students should be pinged on their mobile device to
act as sting operators to evaluate their teachers. Instructions should be sent to their device. There
should also be incentives for these students to use class time as sting operation time (excused
from any work of that class that day). That seems EXTREMELY reasonable. It almost does not get as
covert and discreet as this method, the teacher never knows when they are being evaluated. There
IS one last way however, to approach the evaluations problem. Cameras. Every classroom should
have a simple low resolution camera with microphone to monitor teachers. To save space, time,
and money, it should only work live. Admins will be able to link into any camera in the school and
monitor the teacher remotely without their knowledge. This is the most effective way, but slightly
costly. How much? $200 for every 10 classrooms using a commercial camera and microphone
setup. Say if WOHS had 100 classrooms to be monitored, $2000 doesnt sound like much anymore
considering how many fund raisers the school successfully completes. Hey, if we fire the cashiers in
the cafeteria, 285 hours later with just ONE cashier at minimum wage fired, we wouldve saved the
$2000 we need for 100 classes. Fire 2 cashiers and we can act as Big Brother on 200 classes.

Dress code and weapons checking

Obviously as we can see from the events of a few months ago, WOHS needs to have some sort of
permanent weapon checking system on campus. A few checks the week after the shooting wont
cut it. That was a ridiculous stunt faked to make us feel safer, probably organized by the
superintendent it seems. Dress code is not checked properly at all either, though this is not nearly
as much of a problem at the scale that weapon checks are. Just thought I should bring this to your
attention. I have no definitive proposal to figure out a solution to this problem, simply because I did
not think about it as deeply as the other issues in this essay, but please, do attention to this
specific issue for the safety of our Warriors.

Bathroom policies/planners
More fragmentation at WOHS? You bet. One of my teachers only lets us use the bathroom 3 times a
quarter. Im pretty sure that is illegal first of all, and second, it totally contradicts the standards set
by WOHS for bathroom policies. Use planners? I would, but tell that to teachers. Half of them
require me to write passes on my planner and a fourth dont care, another fourth has some weird
bathroom pass checking system I am forced to abide by. How do we fix this? Get rid of the planners
and get rid of the weird classroom-specific rules. Use either digital IDs or the new physical IDs to
check in and check out of classes using NFC readers. It is SOOOOOOOOO simple. It works
magically. Just tap the scanner that should be mounted on the door of every class (each scanner
costs like, I dont know, $5), and that scanner can automatically note down to Deck the location of

these students. Similar to how attendance should work at WOHS as described earlier! Time
stamping the check-ins and check-outs could also help solve some bathroom vandalism mysteries,
knowing specifically at what time someone went to the bathroom and at what time it was
vandalized according to reports will pinpoint a list of suspects for each mystery. It is ingenious and
devilishly easily to execute.

Library rules, uses, reorganization

I cant use my phone at the library. I cant use the computers for any games other than Coolmath. I
cant DRINK WATER at the library. WHAT. I am dead serious, the librarian does not allow us to drink
water. Fix that, all I can say is the rules there are pathetic, illegal, and fragmented. Thanks to the
schools web filter, I cant access my OneDrive and maybe print out some of the essays I wrote at
home. Gizmodo is blocked. I cant read news at school. WOW. What use is the library when the
computers are basically meaningless? The books right? As long as I need a physical human that
knows nothing about me to recommend and find me a book, that aspect of the library is useless. I
used to read A LOT. I need someone who knows what I used to like to read and then be able to
recommend what I should read next. A human is not ideal for this job. Deck is. Use Deck to help me
navigate the library and find the next book I should read according to my preferences, NOT a
librarian. Also, get rid of barcode scanning on books and move to NFC like in the caf as I
suggested. It is inefficient and slow. The Dewey Decimal system is also stupid, just put the books in
alphabetical order in terms of genre. No need for some weird math system. The USAs students are
pretty low in math scores anyway, dont make math an integral part of READING too now.

Curriculum fragmentation among identical courses

Why is my Bio teacher not doing the same homework and taking the same tests as the other Bio
teachers? Why is my English teacher giving us different projects than the other English teachers?
My Spanish teacher assigning monologues different from the others? The precalc teachers have
absolutely NAILED this. The curriculum is strict and linear and does not differ teacher to teacher. It
is amazing. Every other academic department needs to learn from them. We have calendars for
what we are doing daily every month! Look at that planning! It is insane and makes me wonder
why no other courses have done what the precalc teachers have been able to accomplish.

Need for strict, justified grading rubrics

I showed my teacher a question on my test that she probably had the wrong answer to. She
responded professionals write this test. Do you want me to give you the contact info for the
company and you can argue with them? I curved 4 questions on the test anyway so if you are
going to be picky I wont do it next time. She should be fired and never allowed to work as a
teacher ever again. Not only did she completely ignore my request to look at that question as a
teacher not a test proctor, but she even basically threatened to change her grading style midquarter. WE NEED A JUSTIFIED RUBRIC FOR EACH AND EVERY THING WE DO. I want to know
EXACTLY why I missed a point on this test, or a few points on this homework, or what exactly has
been curved and the math behind this quarter. I asked my teacher to grade my project and he gave
me a 75 for a functional project. He gave a 75 to a nonfunctional project. When I contested that
was unfair, he said Do you want me to make it worse? He is a nice guy and pretty cool so I dont
really want him fired like the last teacher but HE NEEDS TO GIVE ME A SPECIFIC RUBRIC. Just
eyeballing my project and grading me isnt justification, its having lazy ignorance. This is
unacceptable and unfair.

Bus system
We need to track our buses. I am running out of time to type this essay. I will keep this short. Use
NFC tags on every bus and a single person performing bus check-ins, then sending it to Deck.
Decks send the position of buses to Stacks on mobile phones and in 7 th period, on projectors for
teachers to show to students who dont have a mobile device. That is basically it. No more hunting

through the crowd to find a bus, you will know exactly where it is and even when it will depart. Any
sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. In that case, this is the purest
form of magic.

Car parking system

We need to stop selling car parking spots permanently to students. It should either be monthly
subscription based or first-come first-serve. It is that simple. We cant just have parking spots
hogged for the whole school year. Every month a small payment should be made to keep that spot
or just not reserve spots at all. Whoever gets there first, gets to park there for the day.

Fund deployment priorities

Instead of buying whiteboards for all the classes or even planning to buy iPads for everyone,
maybe you should focus on fixing the bells if they fail to go off first.

Vending machines
Add NFC tags to the materials being vended. Add a scanner at the dispenser. Send info about the
vending machine to Deck. I want to be able to place food in my wish list and have Deck notify me
when a vending machine has been restocked with my favorite item and where it is located at the
school. Maybe even let me reserve items.

Disciplinary policies (and their fragmentations)

My Spanish teacher has a list of non-negotiable items pinned to his wall we have to follow. My bio
teacher only allows Gatorade and water but no other drinks. The library allows no drinks at all. We
get a detention for being tardy 3 times in a quarter in some classes, and others just dont care. This
is a unified school with universal rules. Each class cant have their own rules and regulations. Not
to mention some rules are just unnecessary.

The new ID system

This is it. This is the future of the school, what wraps ALL the concepts I have discussed together,
what will unify us all. To start off, let me explain that there are multiple variations of the new ID
system, and these variations will be the ones used to identify one ID from the other within the IT
system at WOHS (which I can offer to write algorithms and sample code for, just not in this essay
due to the fact I am busy for SPRING BREAK): TD, TP, SD, SP, MD, MP. Teachers, students, and
miscellaneous. Each having a digital version and a physical version. EACH physical ID needs to
have an NFC chip inside and a picture of the user. Chip and picture system for physical IDs. This
allows two step verification, one with facial recognition and one computerized NFC chip ownership
verification. Every single ID has a unique serial number (separate from the ID number), and for
security reasons, every time an ID is lost or ruined, the serial number is deleted from the WOHS
database and a new one is assigned as soon as a new ID is prepared for the student. This is much
more secure and smarter than the piece of plastic with a barcode on it we currently use as an ID.
One student can only carry one valid ID, eliminating duplicate ID concerns as only one ID will work
at a time, also eliminating concerns about ID theft. The serial number is what will be used to sign
into WOHS services, not the ID number. If someone has my ID number, they basically have my
details for my entire high school carrier. However, using serial numbers that are changeable allow
my info to be 10x more secure. The NFC chip in the ID will allow interaction with various NFC
readers around the school and the serial number acts as a security pin, while the ID number is just
a student identifier for OCPS, and then the picture is the last step of verification for any humaninvolved activities. Chip + Pin + Picture. EVEN more secure than the credit card system in Europe.
Now it is time to discuss the digital ID, the exact same as the physical one but digital! In the event
a physical ID is misplaced, while waiting for a new unique ID to be made, a student can instantly
receive a new ID on request in the WOHS app. Students can also report their physical ID to be

stolen or missing and receive a brand new digital ID instantly. No more excuses for I left my ID at
home.

The end new beginning

Throughout my past 2 years at WOHS and my 3 years at BWMS, I have always hated the system.
Always wanted change. I never really knew exactly how to fix what was wrong though and didnt
really know if my suggestions would ever be listened to. Whether it be the terribly designed
curriculum guides made by Keys Inc., the ugly website, the horrible WOW TV, the confusing
fragmentations across the school, or just the old fashioned way of doing things, I never appreciated
the work that happened at WOHS. I always thought we were one step back. With the new principal,
I have a small glimmer of hope for change. For reformation. Perhaps I am delusional. I dont know. I
dont think so, but thats usually what happens when you are delusional. We are at a specific point
in time right now that will define WOHS for the next decade or so. That is what happened when the
school was first founded, a defining moment is what created the WOHS we visit every day. Be it for
only 8 hours or so, WOHS is an integral part of our lives. Every Warrior feels this way. One Warrior
Nation. I dont know what it means or why this quotation even exists, but I do know it instilled a
type of pride in me, the same pride that inspired me to sit down and write this essay. Yes I left out a
lot of specific details, but that was due to restriction of time. One thing I DID pay specific attention
to, is realism. I tried to make sure everything in this essay was feasible for a principal, and did not
require involvement from any higher power. I did this on purpose, because I know the OCPS
bureaucracy will not heed to anything, but WOHS might. Heres to change, and the next decade of
success, the wave of new students coming in and the stream of those coming out. Heres to leaving
a legacy behind for the next generation. Heres to reformation.