Week 1

On Monday the SEED students arrived to the Oshman Engineering Design Kitchen (OEDK) to begin the summer internship program. This year we have 9 students from the USA, 4 students from Malawi, and 3 students from Brazil. This program will go for 7 weeks and the students will be in the OEDK working as engineering design interns for 40 hours per week. Because they will spend so many hours together over a short period of time, it was important for them to get to know each other. We encouraged the these connections through ice breaker games. The students also gave presentations that introduced all the interns to the culture of their home country. These presentations included all aspects of culture. Additionally, we spent time talking about cross-cultural experiences, and how to be an effective team member on multi-cultural teams.

By Wednesday the interns had become fairly comfortable with each other and the instructors, though I look forward to seeing the friendships and working relationships continue to grow over the course of the summer. Wednesday also marked day one of a five-day Engineering Design Boot Camp. Boot Camp is a fast paced instruction that walks students through all the steps of an engineering design process. During the Boot Camp, students learn the engineering process using two primary methods. The first is through critique of others application of the design steps, or completing design steps for projects that are already begun. The second is through applying the design process to a new project. Each year for this project the interns design an enrichment or feeding device for an animal at the Houston Zoo. This year the interns have been tasked with designing an enrichment device for the Okapi at the Houston Zoo.

The Houston Zoo owns three Okapi, one male (giraffe like horns) and two females (no horns) . The Okapi are the closest living relative of the giraffe, and though they have markings similar to zebras, they have no relation. Once the interns were given the design prompt the first step of the design process was to clarify the assignment, thus the interns visited the zoo and interviewed Kim the zoo keeper for the hoofstock to learn more about the Okapi, and their enclosure at the Houston Zoo.

Yesterday the interns started brainstorming possible solutions for an Okapi enrichment device. It will be exciting to see what ideas they come up with and to see the development of prototypes next week. This is a great group of students who each bring a unique set of skills and experiences to the team, it is a pleasure to work with them!