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Summer 2012 bloggers

Summer is here, and for the Public Service Center, that means our Fellows and Interns are either already hard at work at their destinations or getting ready to implement their public service projects around the globe.

Listed below are our current bloggers, who will bring to you their experiences. Check back to see their updates!

Mariko Davidson G will work with the Institute of Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP) – an international non-profit – in Ahmedabad, India on a new initiative to increase pedestrian and bicycle access and safety in the city. She will work on developing a local street design handbook over the summer, specifically focusing on creating a safer pedestrian network through dedicated infrastructure initiatives.

Jessica Fujimori '14 will spend this summer in Monduli, Tanzania setting up a science lab at a secondary school in an underserved area. She will create an interactive science curriculum using locally available materials for demonstrations. She hopes her work will help empower and inspire students to continue their education and one day give back to the community.

Melissa Higbee '13 will spend the summer interning at ICLEI-Local Governments for Sustainability. She will work on two projects that help communities in Southern California plan for the impacts of sea-level rise. She will work with partners at the City of Los Angeles on a vulnerability assessment that uses a workshop and survey method to better understand the vulnerability of community assets to sea-level rise. She will also work with city planners and researchers in the San Diego area to develop a Regional Research Agenda that prioritizes the research that local planners need to plan for sea-level rise.

Esther Jang '14 will travel to the Orkeeswa Secondary School in rural Tanzania this summer. She and her project partner Jessica have developed a way for the school to receive wireless Internet access by extending the cellular data network 7 km from the nearby town of Monduli. She hopes to increase the capacity of the school by setting up Internet access for its new computer lab, and also bringing over electronic teaching resources donated by MIT professors.

Zsuzsa Megyery '12 will work with the Caribbean Environmental Health Institute (CEHI) in Castries, St. Lucia, West Indies this summer. Her project approaches water security, as the problem is aggravated with global climate change, to remedy their shortage of healthful, available water year-round. This project is the development of pilot rainwater harvesting systems that will contribute to the foundation of the Pilot Programme for Climate Resilience (PPCR) taking place in St. Lucia this summer. A rainfall-climate analysis will be completed in the context of Hurricane Tomas. Together, her work will complement the current infrastructure in national development planning for both the water system infrastructure and an improved disaster preparedness strategy. Zsuzsa will be using her work this summer to complete her undergraduate thesis project for the MIT EAPS Department.

Dan Rinzler G will work full time for ten weeks for the California Housing Partnership Corporation (CHPC) out of its Los Angeles Office. CHPC is a State-sponsored nonprofit housing policy and financial consulting organization whose mission is to help nonprofit and government agencies develop, preserve, and manage affordable housing for low-income households. His work will strengthen and refine CHPC’s programmatic efforts to preserve housing affordability, reduce utility costs, and improve housing quality for very low-income Los Angeles residents living in at-risk, nonprofit-owned affordable housing. He will also produce key deliverables as part of a larger, MacArthur Foundation-funded effort for CHPC to develop a affordable housing preservation policy and funding framework for the City of Los Angeles.

Video

Watch the latest videos from the MIT Public Service Center. To view our entire collection, got to the PSC Collection on TechTV.

Matt Orosz of STG International discusses solar ORC technology

Matt and his team won the IDEAS Competition in 2004 and 2005. He is continuing his work as an Echoing Green fellow to improve energy access for off-grid communities in Africa.