This project is an exploration to understand why Americanized versions of authentic food are more popular, and how to help authentic ethnic restaurants stay afloat, using Greek authentic cuisine as a case study.

one sentence summary

one sentence before that talks about americanization which is a force of both localization and using local ingredients as well as popularity and fitting the American pallet

one sentence after this resulted in the creation of a new dish that strikes a balance between cost and efficiency and traditional methods and ingredients

This project started by realizing and noticing the effect of food chains taking over and small individually-owned businesses shutting down. Digging deeper, I realized that authentic ethnic restaurants are suffering because of the Americanized versions of the cuisine becoming more popular. I started to explore why they are more popular, and what aspects of authentic cuisines are lacking to stay afloat. I learned that the americanization of food is done by forcing of both localization and using local ingredients as well as popularity and fitting the American pallet

turn that into 2 images , and use that text as a script

one sentence before that talks about americanization which is a f

script: I conducted in-depth research that included interviewing chefs, and people from both sides, and tasting and breaking down different flavors and recipes,folowed by a thematic analysis to help me identify the main aspects that causing that gap. Through that process, being vegan myself, I noticed that vegan options were lacking in authentic restaurants. I used that discovery to create a vegan version of an authentic meal to create more diversity in these restaurants to attempt to appeal to a wider variety of people, and expand more customers.

add images that represent main key words- vegan - authentic -american -

Phase 1 (Research): 

Interviews

• interview authentic restaurant owners
• interview chain (franchise) owners
• interview patrons that go to both 
• interview patrons that only go to one, not the other

Project Scope 

• select the type of cuisine to dive into (Greek, Indian, Mexican)

Sampling 

• Investigate differences in how it's cooked, and presented, its texture, flavor profile 
• Sample from X amount of chains and X amount of authentic restaurants 
• See if you can go back to the kitchen to watch cooking methods! 

methodology

Methodology

prepare interview questions

send out questions

research cuisine culture

visit different types of greek restaurants

review answers and analyze feedback

create dish

present

Phase 1

Phase 2

Phase 3

Phase ONE:

Interview

add images of who you interviewed and what are the main elements of your interviews

Greek Family

Authentic Restaurant

Americanized Restaurant

🇬🇷

🇺🇲

When embarking on recipe development, it's crucial to establish a solid foundation in your chosen cuisine, whether that comes from studying cookbooks, watching cooking shows, or learning from someone experienced. With this groundwork in place, you can unleash your creativity and personalize your meals, using ingredients that resonate with you and reflect your culinary identity. Remember, while a recipe serves as a helpful guide, feel free to improvise and adapt according to your preferences and the ingredients available to you. Additionally, it's essential to consider your audience when preparing food, as tastes and preferences vary widely among individuals. Crafting dishes tailored to specific people involves a subjective approach, acknowledging that not everyone will have the same culinary preferences.

"...Express your creativity through your recipes."

"...Establish a foundation with your cooking."

Advisor Meetings

"...Recipes serve as guides to then be creative."

"...Everyone tastes things differently."

Cambridge, MA

 Woburn, MA

Boston, MA

Belmont, MA

Phase TWO:

Analyze

Phase 2 (Creation):

Explore & Analysis 

• Once I've gathered all my research, data, and sampling... take all that information and put it into a concise analysis — what flavors are most popular? What style of cooking? What are the reasons people go to one place over the other? Why is one better? Is it convenient? Is it taste? other questions?
• Do an analysis of what's different about the two and what makes them appealing. 

add your findings authentic vs american

• The authentic restaurant owners were more willing to be interviewed.
• More spices and labor was included in the authentic restaurants.

elemnts of your interview -flavor profile and ingredience -experience -identity

you can make this into icons

Salt

Salt

Garlic

Garlic

Cumin

Cumin

Onion

Onion

Nutmeg

Nutmeg

Pepper

Pepper

Paprika

Paprika

Dill

Dill

Authentic Restaurant

Americanized Restaurant

Phase 3 (Testing): 

User test

• I will get multiple different people to test out the food and see if it is well portrayed (older people, younger people, people who love this type of food, people who may not necessarily want to try something different) 

Final project idea:

• After conducting studies on cuisine and figuring out what elements are most appealing to the majority of consumers, I will make a cuisine (menu, dishes) that meets in the middle of the two. The goal is to uplift the authentic roots of the original cuisine while also incorporating techniques/flavors that have become popular in chains. 

Phase THREE:

Tasting/Creating

make a slide for each - american vs authentic

precedents of food to make

"Authentic" Vegan Version

Recipe

Notes

Americanized Version

• Not as many ingredients used in this recipe



• Each ingredient was chopped small to make it feel like a smaller portion

• Kalamata Olives
• Cucumber
• Green Pepper
• Red onion
• Tomatoes
• Vegan Feta
• Salt
• Dill
• Pepper

Recipe

Notes

Americanized Version

• Fries lacked extra flavor/spices



• Fried

• Potatoes
• Vegan feta
• Dried oregano
• Salt
• Pepper

"Authentic" vegan version

Recipe

Notes

Americanized Version

"Authentic" vegan version

• Smaller Portion
• Made with Impossible Meat

• Rolled oats
• Chickpeas
• Cloves
• Spinach
• Tomato
• Cumin
• Oregano
• Salt
• Pepper

Throughout this Capstone experience, I learned a lot of new and valuable things. I stepped out of my comfort zone to talk to consumers, chefs, and employees to hear their perspectives on Greek food. I learned how to analyze feedback better, write short, detailed descriptions, and manage my projects efficiently. Overall, I feel proud and excited about my work, and am grateful I got to experience Capstone.

This project is a 3D animated short film about trauma and conflict and how memories can stay with us throughout our lives. I made this film for my parents, who grew up in a conflict zone and experienced similar events. Following the main character's development from early childhood to adulthood, the film tackles how memories and past events inform our present lives.

Thesis

Significance

Advisor: Robert Laplante

Work:

-Blur Studios (CFX)

-DreamWorks Animation (Trolls)

-MPC (Dark Tower, The Mummy)

-Ingenuity Studios (Taylor Swift)

-CoSA (Swamp Thing, SHIELD)

-Brainstorm (Woman in the Window)

-Alkemy X (FOTWD)

-Framestore (Electric Hummer)

Animation Pipeline

• Interviews
• Analysis

• Scriptwriting
• Storyboarding

• Music
• Asset Development
• Visual Development

• Animation
• Compositing

Research

Story Development

Preperation

Creation

Methodology : Research

Interviews

Analysis

Categories

Methodology : Creation Stage 1

Story Development

Storyboarding

Storyboards

Methodology : Creation Stage 2

Music

Asset Development

Artistic Style

Methodology : Creation Stage 2

Animation

Editing

Loving Vincent

In a story depicted in oil-painted animation, a young man comes to the last hometown of painter Vincent van Gogh to deliver the troubled artist's final letter and ends up investigating his final days there.

Loving Vincent is the world's first fully painted film. They painted over 65,000 frames on over 1,000 canvases. 

• how to write a story based on real events
• respecting peoples experiences
• project management
• animation pipeline



What I learned

Challenges

• working with an untested blender add-on
• dramatizing people's real experiences
• timeline
• render times

Capstone Timeline

Research

Outreach

Observations

Brainstorming

Refining

Final Presentation

I spent ten years in a Montessori classroom and I loved every second of my time there. Throughout the years, I learned important building blocks that make the foundation of who I am today. Now, in my final year at NuVu, I love looking into the innovations of technology and how they can benefit the world. This project is the crossroads of two components that are very important to my life: my Montessori education and my love for pushing the limits of what's possible.

Inspiration

Importance

• This year's American Montessori Society's annual conference main theme was Artificial Intelligence

• Future technologies will play a large part in our future, we need to prepare future generations to excel in that world

• If used in the right setting it can help students develop important cognitive skills

Literature Review

• The 4PADAFE instructional design matrix illustrates a practical application of AI in education, enhancing understanding and engagement through personalized assistance.

• Generative design utilizes AI to enhance human creativity rather than replace it, fostering innovation across fields.



• "If you wanted to create an education environment that was directly opposed to what the brain was good at doing, you probably would design something like a classroom."

Emphasize the point that there were doubters of Montessori, and there are now doubters of AI and future technology, but they will be proven wrong like the doubters of Montessori cirriculum

What Is Montessori?

• Teachers are Facilitators
• Freedom to Explore
• Hands-on Learning

Why Technology Doesn't Fit

• Focus on Physical Materials
• Freedom Within Limits
• Direct Interaction with Environment

Outreach

Blake Johnson

Multi-Faceted

Storytelling

Impressionistic

Concrete

Starting Points

Mr. Bob

• Tech Educator
• Always excited about Tech
• Taught Me!!

Pins

Interactive Blocks

Student Identifier

Interactive Display

Brainstorming

Using AI adaptively

Interactive Digital Display

$$$

Too Digital

Multifaceted

Story Telling

Augmented Reality

What About AR?

• Look at existing technology in the classroom
• How is technology being used? Independent or collaboratively?
• How do the teachers feel about it?

WWF Free Rivers AR Game

Questions For Observations

Classroom Observations

Montessori

Technology

Teachers

• Almost everything is learned through discovery and observation
• The open environment encourages self correction

• There is a physical component in every lesson
• Everything is reinforced with reflection/debriefs

• Technology is used to experience the impossible
• Teachers use technology to reinforce what is being learned with physical materials.

Re-Framing

Montessori

Technology

Teachers

Discovery & Exploration

Experience The Impossible

Physical Components

Augmented Reality

"Experience The Impossible"

Sketches

Mocking Quick Prototype

Wireframe

Wireframe

More Interaction!!

More Immersive!!

Material Design

3D Modeling

Object Detection

AR Functionality

3D Modeling

Animation

Design

Material Design

Material Design

Object Detection

AR Functionality

Combining Components

Sorry Maria Montessori

Realism

Collaboration

Thank You!!

Sue Angelides 

Krista Bartolome

Anna Dubrowski

Nada Elsonni

Kari Frentzel

Keenan Gray

Isabel Jacobs

Blake Johnson

Masha Karbovskaya

Rob MacDonald

John Mendizabal

Isa Murray

Amy Neale

Laura O'Leary

Annu Radha Kumar

Sammy Sass

Keith Schacht

Katelyn Shore

Robert Sisson

Matt Stalberger

Hunter Stillwell

Diane Sullivan

Jon Turnquist

Elka Walter

Timeframe

S1

S2

S3

Final

Initial Brainstorming

Concept Research

Project Development

Project Development

Senior Trip



Midreview

Research

Object Salience within Memorization

Emerging Technologies

Vocabulary Memorization within Language Education

BRAGI

BRAGI stands for Bilingual Reality Augmentation for Global Immersion. BRAGI is an application designed to run on an augmented reality platform such as the Meta Quest 3 or Apple Vision Pro. The goal of the project is to simulate immersive language education. The scope for this specific project is a vocabulary memorization system, aiming to support word retention. Inspired by Duolingo learning units, this application presents a novel approach to language education based on object salience as a means to expand a user's vocabulary in a foreign language.

Precedents

Noun Town

MondlyAR

Duolingo

Outreach

Brady Rice

Karl Brommer

Rachel Self

Linguistics Student at UNH

Engineer

Attorney

Goals

The goal of this project is to aid the user in Spanish vocabulary memorization.

Learning Goal

This app will display flashcards over real-world objects, which will quiz users on the Spanish pronunciation of the objects.

Functional Goal

I aim to quantify the application's performance with regards to price per word learned.

Testing Goal

Methodology

Software Development

Application Design

Data Analysis

User Testing

Software Development

User Flow

UX Design

Data Analysis

• Dashboard data representation
• Accuracy
• Perseverence
• Spaced Repetition

User Testing

Financial Performance

Educational Performance

I will measure financial performance by determining the cost-per-interaction of the model

I will measure educational performance by determining the number of interactions needed to learn a word

Features

1. Object recognition
2. Word pronunciation
3. Vocal verification
4. Data visualization

Feature Roadmap

Video Feed

• Oculus privacy policy
• Android Debugger

YOLO Performance