My time spent on this IDEA Grant project has altered how I perceive myself as a student, researcher, and just an individual wanting to leave a meaningful impact on the world around me. The most exciting part of this project has been connecting with industry professionals at AON, who introduced us to DroneDeploy and access to the sandbox environment. It is one thing to develop a tool in a vacuum, but it is something else entirely to acquire feedback from someone with prior tech experience in high-pressure real-world situations. Experienced individuals at AON and FAIA have helped us discover areas for improvement, whether monetization options or integrated automations. Conversations such as these remind me that research is not entirely just about collecting data and writing papers, but also developing real connections and asking better questions.
Digital fluency, one of our established career competencies, has been a significant part of this endeavor. As a cyber-criminology major, I came into this project with a strong technical background, having utilized various software, but putting it all together in a way that is actually functional, stable, and helpful to others is an entirely different skill set. I have had to ask myself whether this is intuitive, and whether someone not in my field would understand what we are trying to do here. It’s become apparent that we cannot just be good at developing a strong machine-learning tool, but we must also translate our work into something people can use. This experience has taught me how to bridge that gap, which will stick with me long after this IDEA Grant process ends.
Looking Forward
As for the next steps, upon returning to FSU full-time, we want to continually improve the app interface and model accuracy to ensure that people want to use this development. There is a lot of potential here in many sectors, from emergency response, resilience planning, and insurance analytics, where aerial views are essential. With this, investment and exploitation will be allocated towards FAA Part 107 certification so that we can fly our drones legally and more independently. This will, in turn, open many more doors for us pertaining to testing, permissions, and data gathering.
Additionally, as mentioned in the previous blog post, following the President’s Showcase, we want to attend a more discipline-specific conference about computer vision during the 2025-2026 academic year. This experience has made me more confident in my educational and professional pursuits. I have always been interested in technology and national security, and this IDEA grant has enabled me to combine my interests meaningfully. I can foresee myself continuing to hone my skills in geospatial tools and drone-based systems not just academically, but occupationally.
Why This Matters: To Me and Others
Our project’s central focus is building an improved system for collecting and labeling drone data in disaster-prone areas. Which is seemingly straightforward: fly drones, collect images, sort and label them. Though the deeper we delved in and the more time invested, it became clearer that what we build, test, and study can genuinely help others in stressful, chaotic situations after disasters. It has been incredibly gratifying that this work can help responders, insurance workers, and residents get a clearer picture efficiently when time and clarity are essential.
More than anything, though, this research has reminded me of the importance of proactivity. These types of opportunities by no means just fall into our laps; we have had to continually reach out, ask questions, and push forward even when we do not have all the answers yet. I have become more confident cold-emailing professionals, building out a pitch for our idea, and holding my own in conversation with those who have been doing this kind of work for decades. It has been an enormous confidence boost, and I will carry this with me for whatever projects or endeavors that are on the horizon.
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