Final Project Presentation and Reflection
The final project that my group and I did was a website for a non-profit organization along with a poster that we designed and printed for the presentation. The problem that we decided to face was actually three different problems and included monoculture in agriculture, lack of flowers in urban landscapes, and lack of education of people on the problems facing the bees. Our solution was to create a nonprofit organization that sold product that encouraged planting flowers to fund a service where Our Diverse Earth customizes plans for farmers to try to reduce their use of monoculture in their business. We would help them make the transition from monoculture to polyculture, and tailor it specifically for each farmer that we were working with at that time. In addition to funding this service, which is a free service for farmers who are willing to participate, the funds would be used to sponsor local beekeeping and education programs to help increase awareness of all of the issues surrounding the bees. To showcase our nonprofit, we created a website (link below) and an information poster (found below).
This project was challenging for multiple reasons, which is why I feel like I gained a lot from the experience. One of the most challenging parts of this project was the fact that it was so open ended. As an engineering student, typically my projects are very structured and specific. This project was very open ended and innovative, which challenged me and my group to try to narrow down a topic and a solution without much help from the project guidelines. This challenged me to think outside the box, while also making sure not to go down a rabbit hole with a topic and lose focus. The second most challenging thing about this project was the teamwork aspect. Though I had been involved in plenty of group projects before, rarely were they projects where we got to choose what we wanted to do instead of following instructions. This meant that we had to collectively agree on all of the aspects of the project, which is more difficult that it sounds. This was a great exercise in discussing different ideas in a civil and professional way, which is a key thing to know in life and in the business world.
If I were to change this project in any way, I would probably try to more thoroughly develop the business plan for the nonprofit, so that we could explain exactly what our process of helping farmers was. Possibly walk through a scenario to showcase what type of work we do and how we go about doing it. I was very proud of this project as a whole, and I enjoyed it very much!
Website:
https://discoverode.wixsite.com/ourdiversearth
Poster:
This project was challenging for multiple reasons, which is why I feel like I gained a lot from the experience. One of the most challenging parts of this project was the fact that it was so open ended. As an engineering student, typically my projects are very structured and specific. This project was very open ended and innovative, which challenged me and my group to try to narrow down a topic and a solution without much help from the project guidelines. This challenged me to think outside the box, while also making sure not to go down a rabbit hole with a topic and lose focus. The second most challenging thing about this project was the teamwork aspect. Though I had been involved in plenty of group projects before, rarely were they projects where we got to choose what we wanted to do instead of following instructions. This meant that we had to collectively agree on all of the aspects of the project, which is more difficult that it sounds. This was a great exercise in discussing different ideas in a civil and professional way, which is a key thing to know in life and in the business world.
If I were to change this project in any way, I would probably try to more thoroughly develop the business plan for the nonprofit, so that we could explain exactly what our process of helping farmers was. Possibly walk through a scenario to showcase what type of work we do and how we go about doing it. I was very proud of this project as a whole, and I enjoyed it very much!
Website:
https://discoverode.wixsite.com/ourdiversearth
Poster:
| our_diverse_earth.pdf |
Ideal Bee Presentation and Reflection:
This project, which is linked below this reflection, was a good representation of the design process. I found it was a great way to practice innovation not only in the initial design of the product, but also in the changes that had to be made during the process. There were several iterations of our idea, each one more refined than the last. This presented a challenge in itself, that of knowing when to stop trying one thing and to change our plan. A good example of this was in creating the exoskeleton. Our original plan was to cut the individual shapes that made up the exoskeleton using the table saw, and then glue them together. We ran into issues with the saw, where the pieces were too small and the cuts were not accurate enough for a polished final product. After a few tries, we decided that the saw would not work, and that we had to try something else. Previously, it was suggested to us to use the vacuum former to create the exoskeleton. We decided to change our approach, and created a 3D model of the back of the bee, and 3D printed it that day. The next day, we came and had plastic vacuum formed around the model. We cut the plastic from the model, and were left with one smooth, polished exoskeleton that we were more pleased with than we would have been with cutting it on the circular saw. I believe that this process of trial and error is essential to good design, and that it is extremely important to be able to tell when to change your approach when something is not going as planned.
This project was also an exercise in teamwork and scheduling. It was an exercise in teamwork because we had to find a way to implement all of the team members’ ideas in the final product, while also maintaining a project that was focused. In addition, trying to manage different members’ schedules to find time outside of class to create the product and presentation was a challenge. We learned that we had to find different tasks for everyone to do individually, and then use the time we had together to compile the different pieces of the product. I believe that we could have used our time more efficiently in the beginning, mainly through making a decision on what to make early on. I believe if we had been clearer in what we wanted to do, we could have used the in-class maker space time to create the pieces that were made outside of class time.
This project was a good learning experience in both teamwork and the design process, and I believe that I took a lot away from the process as well as the finished product we presented. Find the presentation below:
This project was also an exercise in teamwork and scheduling. It was an exercise in teamwork because we had to find a way to implement all of the team members’ ideas in the final product, while also maintaining a project that was focused. In addition, trying to manage different members’ schedules to find time outside of class to create the product and presentation was a challenge. We learned that we had to find different tasks for everyone to do individually, and then use the time we had together to compile the different pieces of the product. I believe that we could have used our time more efficiently in the beginning, mainly through making a decision on what to make early on. I believe if we had been clearer in what we wanted to do, we could have used the in-class maker space time to create the pieces that were made outside of class time.
This project was a good learning experience in both teamwork and the design process, and I believe that I took a lot away from the process as well as the finished product we presented. Find the presentation below:
| ideal_bee.pdf |
"The History of Bees" presentation:
Below is a link to a presentation explaining the novel "The History of Bees" by Maja Lunde.
| The History of Bees |
Breaking Walls in the Construction Industry: An Interview with an Innovator
Suzie Murdock, President, Motz Engineering
The innovator that I interviewed for this assignment was Suzie Murdock, President of Motz Engineering – an MEP design firm. Suzie has been working hard to make her company stand out among the rest by bringing it into a new age. Innovation is a key way of doing this, and she is not afraid to innovate in order to solve problems and be successful.
In this interview, four questions were asked and discussed. The first question was “what is the definition of innovation?”. Suzie’s answer was “the willingness to collaborate with teammates to evolve and overcome hurdles with great solutions”. She greatly stressed the importance of the word “evolve” in that answer, and even pointed to nature as a key example of evolution to survive. This was interesting to me, especially after learning how bees had evolved. We talked about how a company must evolve with the times in order to survive as well. This reminded me of the movie from class showing beekeeping business had evolved to mobile beehives, where bees were taken from one place to the next in order to pollinate where needed.
The second question asked was “what processes/attitudes/routines lead to innovation?”. Her answer was that the number one thing to do in order to be a great innovator was to spend one to two hours a day on self-contemplation or exercise. I asked her why she thought that was so important, and she told me it is because it is a way to train your brain. If you are able to spend time away from everything every day, when you are faced with a large obstacle at work or in your personal life, you are able to stop and remove yourself from the situation in order to not lose focus and become chaotic as the situation becomes worse. This is interesting to me, and made me think about the wicked problems reading that was done for class. This type of intense contemplation is needed for large problems like the bee problem, because if you allow yourself to get swept up in the chaos of the problem, you will not be able to find a solution.
The third question that I asked her was “what are potential issues/problems with innovation?”. She said that her least favorite problem is when innovation is forced on people or companies. She gave the example of the energy restrictions given to HVAC designers. This is an attempt to innovate the amount of energy used in a building, but when it is forced on people who are not passionate or who are indifferent about the problem, they don’t understand why they are being forced to do it. She said the best innovation happens when there is an actual need for it, when people can rally behind it and be passionate about it instead of being forced to do it. This made me think about the problem that we are facing, and how this could be a potential issue if farmers and beekeepers are forced to change their business because of the law, instead of making them passionate about bee preservation so that they naturally begin good practices for the bees. This also reminded me of the Livewell field trip, because there, all innovation they do come from a need to change things.
The last question was “what is a “dream” project that they would like to work on? or have worked on already?”. Suzie talked about a project she is working on where they are trying have a “Net Zero” campus – where all waste is balanced by conservation on the site. She talked about wanting to do more of those, as well as renovating an engineering building on a school campus like UC. She also talked about wanting to design the next Reds’ stadium, and wanting to be the engineering of record for that build.
In this interview, four questions were asked and discussed. The first question was “what is the definition of innovation?”. Suzie’s answer was “the willingness to collaborate with teammates to evolve and overcome hurdles with great solutions”. She greatly stressed the importance of the word “evolve” in that answer, and even pointed to nature as a key example of evolution to survive. This was interesting to me, especially after learning how bees had evolved. We talked about how a company must evolve with the times in order to survive as well. This reminded me of the movie from class showing beekeeping business had evolved to mobile beehives, where bees were taken from one place to the next in order to pollinate where needed.
The second question asked was “what processes/attitudes/routines lead to innovation?”. Her answer was that the number one thing to do in order to be a great innovator was to spend one to two hours a day on self-contemplation or exercise. I asked her why she thought that was so important, and she told me it is because it is a way to train your brain. If you are able to spend time away from everything every day, when you are faced with a large obstacle at work or in your personal life, you are able to stop and remove yourself from the situation in order to not lose focus and become chaotic as the situation becomes worse. This is interesting to me, and made me think about the wicked problems reading that was done for class. This type of intense contemplation is needed for large problems like the bee problem, because if you allow yourself to get swept up in the chaos of the problem, you will not be able to find a solution.
The third question that I asked her was “what are potential issues/problems with innovation?”. She said that her least favorite problem is when innovation is forced on people or companies. She gave the example of the energy restrictions given to HVAC designers. This is an attempt to innovate the amount of energy used in a building, but when it is forced on people who are not passionate or who are indifferent about the problem, they don’t understand why they are being forced to do it. She said the best innovation happens when there is an actual need for it, when people can rally behind it and be passionate about it instead of being forced to do it. This made me think about the problem that we are facing, and how this could be a potential issue if farmers and beekeepers are forced to change their business because of the law, instead of making them passionate about bee preservation so that they naturally begin good practices for the bees. This also reminded me of the Livewell field trip, because there, all innovation they do come from a need to change things.
The last question was “what is a “dream” project that they would like to work on? or have worked on already?”. Suzie talked about a project she is working on where they are trying have a “Net Zero” campus – where all waste is balanced by conservation on the site. She talked about wanting to do more of those, as well as renovating an engineering building on a school campus like UC. She also talked about wanting to design the next Reds’ stadium, and wanting to be the engineering of record for that build.
Reflection: Greenacres Farm
This trip was really quite the eye-opener for me. For the first week of class, we had been using multiple research methods to learn about the bees and how they are being negatively affected by different things such as pesticides, monocultures, and parasites. These research methods include a very informative TED Talk, a documentary, and an interesting set of podcasts. The farm has ways to counteract much of these causes of bee death. First and foremost, they do not use pesticides on any of their farms. When you hear about pesticide use, it seems as though it is the only option for farmers to keep their plants safe from pest insects. However, on this trip, I learned that this is not the case. Green acres uses an entirely different method, one that is much safer for both humans and bees alike. They use insects that are natural enemies of the pest insects, essentially growing soldiers to protect their plants. Seeing this on a commercial farm gave me some sort of hope for pesticide use to be greatly diminished at some point in the future, as there are alternatives I had not known about before. The farm also battles monoculture- where only one type of plant can be found for vast areas of land. Most large-scale farmers will only plant specific crops, which means when the crops are out of bloom, bees have nowhere to feed. This is also affected by the lack of wildflowers found on many farms. Both of these are not issues within Greenacres. This is because they plant multiple crops, and cycle them throughout the year. In addition, they plant top crops like clover to create more nutrient rich soil and also provide food for pollinators like bees. It was very enlightening to see pro-pollinator farming up close, and to see that it is sustainable and possible for commercial farming.
The most interesting and informative part of the trip for me was hearing about native bees. Prior to the trip, I had listened to the podcast that talked about native bees. It was very eye-opening to know that the death of honeybees should not be what we are concerned with, but rather the death of the native bees. And understanding that honeybees, in fact, are part of the problem. Both the podcast, and the presenter at Greenacres, addressed this. The reason that honeybees are the problem is because they steal the resources from the native bees in the area. The most interesting thing I learned from the presenter at Greenacres was the fact that native bees can be better pollinators than honeybees. They sting less, they pollinator more efficiently, and they can be raised by anyone. She went through the steps of how to create native bee habitats, and I was flabbergasted by how easy it was. Anyone can do it, and if native bees were commercialized, it would help native bee populations and the farmers themselves. This gave me a whole new outlook on the things we had been learning about the honeybee industry, and about the bees in general.
Overall, I would say that this trip helped me to put what we were learning into a practical sense, and helped me see how it all worked in person. In addition, I would say this trip gave me hope for the future of bees and the industry they ae used in.
The most interesting and informative part of the trip for me was hearing about native bees. Prior to the trip, I had listened to the podcast that talked about native bees. It was very eye-opening to know that the death of honeybees should not be what we are concerned with, but rather the death of the native bees. And understanding that honeybees, in fact, are part of the problem. Both the podcast, and the presenter at Greenacres, addressed this. The reason that honeybees are the problem is because they steal the resources from the native bees in the area. The most interesting thing I learned from the presenter at Greenacres was the fact that native bees can be better pollinators than honeybees. They sting less, they pollinator more efficiently, and they can be raised by anyone. She went through the steps of how to create native bee habitats, and I was flabbergasted by how easy it was. Anyone can do it, and if native bees were commercialized, it would help native bee populations and the farmers themselves. This gave me a whole new outlook on the things we had been learning about the honeybee industry, and about the bees in general.
Overall, I would say that this trip helped me to put what we were learning into a practical sense, and helped me see how it all worked in person. In addition, I would say this trip gave me hope for the future of bees and the industry they ae used in.
