HEST graduate students display their innovation at the Smithsonian

Over spring break 2019, fresh humanitarian engineering graduates Jennifer Ventrella (MS Mechanical Engineering with dual MS in Applied Anthropology) and Dr. Mohammad Pakravan (Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering with Economics minor), advised by Dr. Nordica MacCarty, were funded to display their innovation at the VentureWell OPEN Minds Exhibition. The Exhibition was the crowning event of the VentureWell OPEN conference focusing on innovation and entrepreneurship and held at the Smithsonian National Museum of American History on March 30th, 2019. The team has been working to develop the Fuel, Usage, and Emissions Logger (FUEL) to quanitfy the impact of clean cookstoves and fuels used in homes in developing communities. This social innovation has received Stage 1 and Stage 2 student e-team grants from VentureWell to suport it's development, and helped Dr. MacCarty to secure a faculty grant from VentureWell to develop a new HEST course called "HEST 201:Introduction to Innovation for Global Development", coming to campus Fall 2019.