The report includes a brief citation to our presentation during the American Society of Engineering Education in Austin, TX.

June 14-17, 2009 – Drexel Smart House and Drexel University’s Library presented a collaborative proposal for information-literacy development to the American Society of Engineering Education in Austin, TX.

See: Drexel Smart House Six Month Report and News and Interests from Drexel Green web site

Abstract:

The Library-Smart House partnership seeks to design and implement a sustainable, virtual
environment for collaboration that will seamlessly integrate project communication and
information access. This virtual environment will provide a means for increased collaboration
between students, faculty, librarians and outside contributors as well as ensure the sustainability
of the project in coming years.
The Smart House is a student-led, multidisciplinary project to retrofit an existing house to be a
living-laboratory. The house will be a platform for testing innovations in the areas of energy,
health, environment, interaction, and lifestyle. The ultimate goal of the organization is to
improve the quality of life for those living and working in an urban residential setting. The
Smart House is a collaborative design project not only across different disciplines, but also
across student year and domain knowledge levels. This collaboration produces a wide array of
student information needs and presents a unique opportunity for library collaboration.
The Library plans to study the effectiveness of information literacy instructional techniques
through the contextual setting of the Smart House. The Library seeks to improve the ability of
participants to access, evaluate, and use high quality research materials effectively through a
variety of instructional strategies. By developing and maintaining a virtual infrastructure for
information awareness and access using relevant technologies, the library will be able to assist
students at their point of need. More direct instruction will be provided through a series of active
learning workshops combined with specialized research consultation. We believe that this project
will promote the lifelong learning skills necessary for the Engineer of 20201 by providing
interdisciplinary collaboration paired with information literacy instruction within the framework
of Smart House design.

Library-Smart House Collaboration for Information Literacy Development:

See: Paper and Presentation

Source:  2009 ASEE Annual Conference – Engineering Libraries Division

he senior design team of Eric Eisele, Courtney Reid, Dan Pugh, Sarah Byrnes, and Charlie Woods was awarded a Phase II People, Prosperity, and Planet Award from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).  Competing against 43 university teams, the Drexel University Department of Materials Science and Engineering team received one of six Phase II awards on Monday, April 20, 2009 in Washington, D.C. at the National Sustainable Design Expo.

The award-winning senior design project, “Cool Roof Coatings Utilizing Glass Hollow Microspheres for Improved Solar Reflectance,” increases the reflectance of cool roof coatings while cutting raw material costs. Cool roof coatings save energy and mitigate the urban heat island effect. Previously, the team received a Phase I award in the amount of $10,000.  The Phase II awards provide $75,000 of funding for two years and will be used to develop the coating further and field test the technology by reaching out to the neighborhoods surrounding Drexel. The team will work in conjunction with the Drexel Smart House initiative.

See:  Senior Design Team Wins $75,000 Phase II EPA Funding