Gratitude, Transparency, and the Story Behind This Course
This course reflects years of classroom practice, a full redesign for project‑based learning, and the support of open‑source communities and modern AI tools.
Hi, I'm Daniel Bo. I grew up in Hawaii, USA and have spent 25 years teaching students how to think clearly, build confidently, and present their work with pride. Before teaching, I served as a linguist for the U.S. Department of Defense. I’ve also started three businesses—including a current AI education company in Thailand with distribution to over 100 schools.
My classroom north star is simple: make learning practical, honest, and empowering. That’s why this course is project‑based, Excel‑heavy, and focused on real decisions businesses make every day.
How This Course Was Built
From paper notes to a modern, interactive textbook
I taught this course for three years using a standard textbook, rewriting units to be more hands‑on each semester. By the end, the textbook was mostly a reference—the work happened in teams, spreadsheets, and presentations.
I redesigned the course from scratch to center PBL, financial storytelling, and Excel automation (tables, SUMIF/SUMIFS, Goal Seek, scenarios, and more). Every unit builds toward the capstone.
- Fall 2024: Planned the capstone (artifacts, rubrics, and timeline).
- Early Spring 2025: Wrote scripts and long‑form text for a paper textbook.
- Late Spring 2025: Planned the 8 units of instruction in detail.
- Summer 2025: Rewrote everything as an interactive Next.js course.
The result is what you see here: a structured, online textbook with interactive checks, realistic datasets, and a clean path from first lesson to investor‑ready capstone.
How AI Helped Build This App
Honest credit where it’s due
I relied heavily on AI coding assistants during development—Google Gemini, OpenAI ChatGPT, and Anthropic Claude—along with agentic tools like Roo Cline, Claude Code, OpenAI Codex, and Gemini CLI.
While the course (curriculum design, learning sequence, and assessments) was created by me, very little of the online application code was typed directly by me. My role was to architect, review, and integrate—using AI tools to speed up implementation while keeping the vision consistent.
Acknowledgments
To my students—thank you for your curiosity, honest feedback, and high standards. To fellow teachers and mentors—your advice shaped the pacing, tone, and clarity of this work.
- Next.js and the React ecosystem
- Tailwind CSS and
shadcn/ui(with Radix primitives) - Recharts and data‑viz libraries
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