12 minute read
MCSI Supports Novel Academic Programs Across the Disciplinary Spectrum
Core Academic Programs and Courses
The Mascaro Center sponsors several courses, certificates, and degree programs. More information on all MCSI academic programs can be found online under “Academics.”
Advertisement
Undergraduate Certificate
• 63 students graduated with Certificate in AY22
Certificate Core Courses
• 77 students in Current Issues in fall and spring • 57students in Capstone fall and spring • This year was about the same as last year for total enrollment. This year was the first time we offered Capstone in the fall semester. However, for fall combined offerings of Current Issues &
Capstone we already have 99 enrolled for fall, and 22 on the waitlist.
Transcription of Distinction
• 23 students enrolled • 2 students awarded in Spring 2022 (4 total)
MS in Sustainable Engineering
• 1 Spring 2022 graduate • 7 students enrolled • 10 Students accepted for Fall 2022
PhD in Circular Economy
• First cohort of 3 students in Fall 2022
First Year Sustainability Engagement
MCSI leads a campus-wide offering of a 15-minute Sustainability presentation aimed at introducing students to the range of sustainability initiatives at Pitt and the many ways they can engage with sustainability on campus. The presentations are available both in-person and virtually, both with trained student volunteers. In Academic Year 2022, we hosted 19 in-person presentations, one presentation over Zoom, one prerecorded presentation, and one Admitted Students Day presentation over Zoom. These offerings engaged over 450 students from a variety of academic departments.
MCSI also hosted a virtual Sustainability Engineering First-Year Panel with four student leaders and one Chemical Engineering alumna. 145 first-year Engineering students attended the panel, which is more than double the number of students attending last year. Panelists shared their academic and professional paths in sustainability and answered questions about getting involved.
MCSI’s Undergraduate Research Program has supported over 325 students in the past 17 years. This Summer, we are supporting 26 students representing 14 different departments. Read about our 2022 faculty members, projects, and student participants here.
MCSI would like to especially thank the generous donors who support this program.
Undergraduate Research: 2022 Service Projects
MCSI’s summer undergraduate researchers have service requirements consisting of two service projects that take place throughout the summer . MCSI Intern Emily Albrecht helped to coordinate these service projects with community partners. In May 2022 , researchers attended a service project at the Oasis Farm and Fishery in Homewood, helping construct the high tunnel greenhouse and a pergola, transplanting crops in the raised garden beds, and removing invasive species. The June service project took place in the Hill District with local nonprofit organization Grounded. Researchers worked to improve the aesthetic character of the Grounded site (along with its usability and programming opportunities) by incorporating both edible and native planting components.
Undergraduate Research: Highlights and Outcomes
Pitt Sustainability Dashboard
Led by Dr. Aurora Sharrard and the Office of Sustainability, the Pitt Sustainability dashboards grew out of an MCSI undergraduate summer research project. In FY22, the Office of Sustainability launched the Healthy Ride dashboard developed by undergraduate Aaron Carr. Recently rebranded POGOH, the University’s partnership with Pittsburgh’s nonprofit bike share organization supports 2018 Pitt Sustainability Plan goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions from commuter transportation 50% by 2030.
The Picogrid Digital Twin Laboratory
Led by Dr. Bob Kerestes, the Picogrid Digital Twin lab is now fully energized, and experiments are being conducted. One of the main contributors to the project was undergraduate Electrical Engineering student, Jack Carnovale, who presented the project at Engineering’s Undergraduate Research Poster in Spring 2022.
Undergraduate Research: Student Awards
Best Poster Award
MCSI undergraduate researcher Lauren Wewer received the best poster award during the American Society for Metals (ASM) Young Members Night Poster Competition. Lauren worked with Dr. Xiong through the MCSI Undergraduate Summer Research program on the topic of graded alloy additive manufacturing.
Big Idea Competition
Pitt students Becca Segel, Priscilla Prem, and Maya Bhat from Dr. James McKone’s lab won first prize ($25,000) in the Randall Family Big Idea Competition. FlowCellution’s mission is to provide the testing capabilities necessary to create next-generation flow batteries. Dr. David Sanchez serves as a practice presentation pitch judge for the competition.
PATENT DISCLOSURE
“Integrated Platform for Measuring Electro-Chemical Properties of Flowable Materials” filed in late 2021. PhD student Becca Segel is the lead inventor. She is working to pursue further development of this technology with Noah French, a 2022 MCSI summer undergraduate researcher.
2022 Faculty Awards in Sustainability
MCSI’s annual faculty awards are designed to engage faculty who want to advance the University’s mission of interdisciplinary excellence in sustainability research and education. Read more about the faculty and their projects.
Len Peters Faculty Fellowships in Sustainability
John C. Mascaro Faculty Awards in Sustainability
Daniel Andrews-Brown
Geology & Environmental Science
Mike Blackhurst
University Center for Social & Urban Research
Tony Kerzmann
Mechanical Engineering & Materials Science
Patrick Shirey
Geology & Environmental Science
Joaquin Rodriguez Alonso Chemical & Petroleum Engineering
Sustainability Based Curriculum for Chemical Engineering
Sarah Moore
Film and Media Studies Filmmaking as a Sustainable and Environmental Practice
Mohamed Bayoumy
Electrical and Computer Eng Integrating Green Electronics Education into ECE classes
Kay Shimizu
Political Science Digital Teaching Module for Sustainable Food Systems
Corey Suzanne Flynn
Physical Therapy Sustainable Food Systems course
These Pitt courses were developed and/or reimagined by faculty who received MCSI faculty awards.
Environmental Justice Seminar Danielle Andrews-Brown& Cassie Quigley
Freedom Seminars: Environmental Justice and Collective Economies and Global Water, Activism, and STEM Pedagogies
Two Freedom Seminars were offered during the 2021-22 academic year. Each section had 18 students enrolled, including undergraduate and graduate students. Students had various academic backgrounds, including Computer Science, Education, Environmental Studies, Law, and Political Science.
GES: GEOL 1316 (Environmental Justice): This new course was created by a group of students Dr. Danielle Andrews-Brown mentored for Ward Allebach’s Sustainability course. It will be taught by Dr. Patrick Shirey.
ENGR 1029: Intro to Engineering for Humanity Ian Nettleship
Taught for the first time in the Fall 2021, “Introduction to Engineering for Humanity” has been designated as the required lecture course for the Engineering for Humanity Certificate and will be offered annually. The course starts by introducing the hierarchy of human needs and the role of engineering in providing services to marginalized communities. The second part introduces appropriate technologies that leverage locally available materials and artisanal skills to develop human capital in small-scale engineering projects. The difficulty experienced in scaling engineering solutions on a global scale is addressed. The third part of the course focuses on the planning and implementation of small-scale engineering projects in marginalized communities. Maintaining project services beyond the end of the project cycle is a major consideration in each stage of the project framework, including community appraisal, project design, planning, implementation, and assessment. Aspects of social sustainability are emphasized, including identification of community stakeholders in community appraisal, considering their inclusion in decision making, participation in the project, and a sense of project ownership.
The International Development Badge Muge Finkeland David Fraser
The new International Development Badge working group aims to establish a network of Honors College and GSPIA students, who work together to produce high impact and policy-oriented research on a select number of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The main goals for student-pairs are: 1) Expose, educate, engage, and inspire undergraduate students to do applied development policy-oriented high-impact research. 2) Give GSPIA students a chance to mentor and work in teams to produce locally-applicable policy outputs aligned with global goals (thus, putting their classroom training into use; in GSPIA terms we are “calling on all changemakers.”)
In its first year, the working group brought together 5 Honors College undergraduate students and 6 GSPIA students to work on 5 SDGs. During Fall 2021, the groups researched the SDGs at the global level and met with global policy experts. In Spring 2022, the groups worked closely with a local nonprofit and government agency to identify how their work contributes to progress on SDGs. Each group identified a deliverable in collaboration with their local partners and presented their work at the end of the year.
Organic Chemistry-II Laboratory Manisha Nigam
In Fall 2021, Dr. Nigam implemented a green laboratory experiment in the Organic Chemistry-II Laboratory, which was developed by her research lab. In this lab, lemon juice was used as a reagent, which helped to eliminate the use of much more harmful sulfuric acid. This enabled Pitt Johnstown students to identify and understand various Green Chemistry principles associated with green reactions and enabled students to use H NMR spectroscopy data to identify the imine product. The benefits of this green experiment include shorter experimental times via the use of efficient precursors and synthesis of efficient precursors that are otherwise expensive to procure commercially. In Spring 2022, Dr. Nigam developed a solventless aldol reaction in her research laboratory that was implemented in the Organic chemistry curriculum. This was used to help students reinforce their spectroscopic knowledge, determine the reaction mechanism through evidence-based inquisition, and identified the principles of green chemistry.
Sustainable Food Systems ENGR 1909/GEO 1307/HRS 1909 Corey Flynn
The goal of the Sustainable Food Systems course is to inspire students across all programs to work together and think differently about their relationship with the environment. Course content included creating a large pollinator garden, exploring community urban farms, cooking heart and planet healthy meals at the Phipps Conservatory Teaching Kitchen, and working at the Black Urban Garden and Farm. Students learned about bee keeping, companion planting, food apartheid, and food justice from the BUGS farmers.
Professor LeMieux developed a new Seminar in Composition (to be taught in Fall 2022) which is a course taken by almost all undergraduates at the University of Pittsburgh. In this permanent variant, students will engage with Sustainability as both a practice and interdisciplinary field of study. They will read texts that work to define sustainability and sustainable living and produce writings that examine practices of sustainability and the notion that sustainability doesn’t require an overhaul in how we experience and engage the world around us. LeMieux will also be submitting a new “EcoComposition” course for review in Fall 2022 to be taught Fall 2023.
In both Fall 2019 and 2021, Patrick Shirey has been teaching the week-long Pitt Provost Academy course on “Urban Ecology & Sustainable Food Systems” for incoming first-year students. The course helps recruit undeclared first-year students to Environmental Science and Environmental Studies courses and majors. Focusing the curriculum on the native pawpaw (a fruit important to Native Americans, European Colonists, and African Americans), Dr. Shirey starts the week by serving the students homemade pawpaw dessert to get them excited about the fruit. To help introduce students to the Pittsburgh community, students have worked with local nonprofit Grow Pittsburgh to help set up a farm stand in food desert neighborhoods (2019), installed deer fence around native plants in Frick Park with the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy (2019), removed invasive vines in Schenley Park (2021), and planted pawpaw tree seedlings on the Pitt Campus (2019, School of Public Health lawn on 5th Avenue; 2021, Vera Street below the baseball stadium outfield wall). To connect students to the Pitt campus and their own futures, this learning experience asks students to envision harvesting the fruit of these trees at their fifth-year homecoming post-graduation. At the end of their experience, students present what they learned to the Provost and other administrators.
One group from the CHE 0500 course on “Systems and Engineering I: Dynamics and Modelling” (Fall 2021-22) worked under the guidance of Dr. David Sanchez (MCSI), in collaboration with leaders from Micronesian Islands Sustainability programs on a global project entitled “Shore Erosion Resulting from Sea Level Rise in Micronesian Islands”. They presented a poster and a presentation on the ChE Global Day 2021 (University of Pittsburgh, Global Hub, Posvar, December 3, 2021) and were awarded with the best presentation. The Mascaro Center partnered on the “ChE Global Day in both Fall 2021 and Spring 2022, where 14 outreach projects were presented. Dr. David Sanchez represented the MCSI in the panel of judges with representatives from industry and academia.
