Hey guys!! Wow it feels like just yesterday we talked to you all about the creation of the team M&S! Even before that, this year over all has been a wild ride. We started from the group of M.O.M. and through many troubles (that you all already know about) emerged and created the group of M&S research. At the beginning our goal was simply to just become more aware of the impacts of stress on adolescent girls, but we ended up learning a lot more than that due to the change in our focus of the research.
Even I, Monica Martinez, that have had previous experience writing labs, learned a lot about the process of having research projects approved. We had no idea that It actually takes a long time before scientist can even begin to perform experimental trials, especially when it comes to humans. Most of our project time was spent creating and developing our deliverable. Which you guys know took a while to complete. Even after all of the content was placed, it took many drafts and the help of our teacher Ms. Miesner to correct some grammatical errors as well as re-write our ideas in a way that could be understood by our readers.
When we finally completed our deliverable, the experimental trials was the next step. Little did we know that our troubles were only just beginning. You can imagine the shock that we had when we found out that our participant’s charts were too complicated and we did not have enough time to complete our proper experimental research. We were told that instead of focusing on looking at stress and blood pressure from a bias standpoint, we should try to look at it in a manner that leaves us open to many possible answers. Which was hard for me, Sabrina Lomeli, because I was incharge of the main graphs and charts that we used to collect information and I had to modify and re-print and re-collect the data at least three times in order to have the tables properly reflect our information and objective. Even though this was a little disappointed to both of us, due to all the hard work we had put on researching the background information, we persevered and continued this project as best as we could. Turns out that evaluating the data was just as hard. Because our participants were only twenty subjects and not one hundred as it should be in an experimental trial, we did not have sufficient data to form a proper conclusion. This hurdle was what taught us that sometimes in the adult world one must just make what’s best with what one is given; “When life gives you lemons, make lemonade”.
We finished the project and got to show our information in the Make-O-Rama at our school. It actually shocked a lot of people how close their blood pressure was to the health marks of high or low blood pressure.
Now that the project is finished, and things are slowly becoming normal around the class, we can’t help but notice some things that we could have done better. As we mentioned the research pool should have been bigger, there should have been more days tested, and a better blood pressure device should have been used. The participants,during testing, were also exposed to many distractions which could have also have an impact in our data. We hope that with this experimental research someone can pick up where we left off or create another experiment similar to it. We had a great time and we hope that you guys enjoyed reading of our adventures as much as we enjoyed writing them. Good bye!
StarPathDesign 
Sounds like your group had a lot of problems that you still managed to work through, and I admire your tenacity and resolve to continue your project. As one of your subjects, I found it really interesting to see how my blood pressure changed with my relative stress levels, though I’m sorry your sample size was giving you so much trouble. I was listening (eavesdropping, really, sorry about that) when you two were trying to figure out how to evaluate the data you’d collected, and you seemed to have a lot to consider and think about when formulating a conclusion. It was fun to listen to and I managed to learn more about your project just from that. I hope someone does continue this study, because I think you were definitely on to something in connecting blood pressure to stress, especially at this school.
–Rachel Z.
In knowing the intentions of the project, researching and collecting data, I feel like this project could have a positive impact in bringing awareness and maybe lead to something bigger. Also it is a unique thing to focus on. There are more components that could be incorporated into this project that could further improve coming to a consensus and analyzing data. I also have learned quite a bit in listening to the presentation given.
-Carina Carrasco
I like the fact that you two have had a lot of hard problems, yet you never seemed to let it stop you or put you in a mental hold where you didn’t know what to do after. I personally found what you were researching very unique and thought it was very relevant to our school, which is why I wanted to be one of your test subjects. I didn’t know of some of your problems that you guys had been running into, but it seems like at the end it worked out for the best. I am curious how things went a little more at the Make-o-Rama however, but I believe your project ended up well. I’m sure everyone in every group has some things they would go back and change, but I know you guys should be proud for completing a difficult level of research and testing. Bravo.
-Alana C.
Great job! Honestly being able to get your project approved and getting the experimental trials done shows how hard you perservered through the whole experience. This is such a great project, and it’s something that a lot of students face when dealing with school, work and life. It is a tough time in our lives and projects like this can help validate that fact, and also help to find ways to overcome adolescent stress.
-Gabriela Ornelas
It was hard for my group to do research too. I felt like we did not have enough research skills or experience to write effective and good papers. It was really stressful to get all of the brainstorming done to start the project so that it could be done by April. It was always hard to hear something last minute and have to find different ideas or not do something at all because of time constraints, but you did it and you are done! -Brianna C.
For this blog Post we feel we should be given a 95 because we had cross reference past blog post and looked into the past deliverable to be able to make sure that our comparison was correct. We also worked on this collaterally in a manner that showcased our separate personalities. -Sabrina L and Monica M