New England

 View Only

College Outreach - Volunteers Wanted!

  • 1.  College Outreach - Volunteers Wanted!

    Posted 04 Apr, 2022 07:00
    Volunteers wanted!

    AIAA New England section is looking for more volunteers to work with our college student branches. If you're interested, please contact us!


    Updates from the recent visit to Wentworth Institute of Technology (WIT):

    Council member Charlie Wilson visited the AIAA student branch, WITAERO, at Wentworth Institute of Technology on March 18, 2022.  This visit had been rescheduled several times from its first date in December because of covid and school co-op schedules.

    Six of the 25 student members were available for this visit, including the advisor and branch founder Professor Haifa El-Sadi, students President Katerina Koukounaras and Co-President  Ryan Smallwood. (Twenty had been available if earlier visits had been possible.)

    The WIT branch has high visibility on the AIAA website.  This photo is the second one on the AIAA Student Branch website.

    The school will fund travel by all ten of its seniors to the 26th Annual Design, Build, Fly Competition on 21–24 April 2022 in Wichita, KS, a testament to their importance at WIT.  They showed off their entry.

     

    Significant comments:

    • The students asked if we could help arrange Career Fairs or visits by single companies – the highest priority.
    • Professor El-Sadi asked if an interchange between the school and industry could be established to provide recommendations for possible modifications to the school’s curriculum to better meet the industry’s needs.
    • The students had comments about the form we send to all schools describing the requirements to be eligible for one of our College Outreach grants.
    • These are being addressed.

     

    This photo replicates the one above with the student and Professor El-Sadi standing in front of their subsonic wind tunnel. From left to right: Ryan Smallwood, Thomas Merten, Katerina Koukounaras, Professor El-Sadi, Ian Flynn, Anthony Glas, and Chris Tamer.

    In summary, this was an interesting and successful visit. The presentation was done by Charlie was excellent, the discussion between Charlie, students, and the faculty advisor was very valuable and productive. Charlie as a representative of AIAA demonstrated interest in developing student knowledge and skills in aerospace by creating collaboration between members (both academia and industry). Visiting other branches is a great idea to encourage collaboration between the branches. In 2017, Charlie arranged a visit at the MIT branch between all student branches which could make it. The WITAERO students described their activities and reported that it was a great experience.



    ------------------------------
    Hiro Endo
    AIAA-New England
    Secretary
    ------------------------------