This past week the MTAGIC team took its talents to P.K. Yonge Developmental School to recruit for the studies coming up in weeks to come. The recruitment process was pleasant eventhough members of the team were slightly nervous given that none of us had recruiting experience. Recruitment consisted of us interacting and conversing with parents as they picked up their children. We gave them a quick rundown of who we were and a brief study explanation; if they were interested we gave them a packet containing more information and documents that were to be signed. Many of the kids stood with their parents as we explained and seemed enthused about the chance to play with touch screens. The first day we gave away between 60-65 packets which was awesome!

I recently transferred to UF just this Spring, so I am still getting in the flow of a new location. I am pursuing my Ph.D in Human-Centered Computing, which will be a new Ph.D program in Fall 2015. Currently, I am the only Ph.D student on the MTAGIC team and with time will become project lead. MTAGIC is very interesting, I have 5 nieces and nephews and they always seem to amaze me with the capabilities they have and their advanced of technological knowledge at such a young age. This project puts me in one of the many driver seats of influencing a generation of young creative minds to let their minds run wild with creativity and productivity. The recruitment process was very enjoyable for the simple fact that, many parents stated their children were better with their phone than they were. This made me remember when I was a kid and we got our first computer, maybe I was 8, my mom would always say the same thing in regards to using the computer; that computer, along with video games, led me on this path of advancing computational technologies for children like me.