Engineers are an inherently curious lot. That’s why they often look at familiar things in strange ways. They tend to focus on things that others don’t usually pay much attention to, so they ask “What is its purpose?” and “Could we make it better?’
The drinking-water tap in your house is an example. The tap is just one part of a large system that normalises access to clean water. Behind it is unseen infrastructure that most people take for granted.
Good engineers looking at a water tap will see and understand the underlying innovation and engineering that make water distribution possible. Beyond that, they may also consider the multifaceted issues surrounding access to clean drinking water, that are far more complex than the mechanics of the tap itself.
More than merely appreciating one of our most important innovations — the clean water distribution system— they will ask bigger questions, such as “How does human action impact access to clean water?”
Understanding human elements
Getting opportunities to learn how to see and understand such human elements of engineering design is essential to becoming a globally aware engineer, who is prepared to confront world’s biggest technological challenges.
‘Empathetic’ is the word to describe engineers who go beyond simply finding ways to solve complex problems to actually starting a company to provide those solutions. We need engineers who also want to put their entrepreneurial and leadership skills into practice to improve the human condition through whatever technologies and systems they are developing.
To enable this, colleges and universities need to empower students to think creatively and act boldly in pursuit of such goals.
Seizing opportunities
It is important to guide students in cultivating their abilities to seize entrepreneurship opportunities, to learn from failure, and to efficiently direct their passion and resourcefulness to solving problems.
While learning technical, interpersonal, business and communication skills, students should also be provided with experiential learning opportunities that foster the kind of innovative thinking from which empathy-driven engineering solutions can spring.
Engineering students must practice generating ideas and gaining experience in product design and development. Making prototypes and seeking feedback from potential users should be part of their study.
Those efforts teach the skills needed by aspiring entrepreneurs — skills that engineers use to turn ideas into reality.
Making positive impact
Through this kind of multifaceted educational approach, students learn to be mindful of the intended and unintended consequences of the use of technologies that engineers design. From there, they become motivated by the idea of making a positive impact on society — and on the lives of individuals— through their work.
The endeavours of the Arizona State University alumni, who founded Neolight provide a good example.
Sivakumar Palaniswamy (biomedical engineering), and Deepakshyam Krishnaraju (mechanical engineering) worked with business alumni Vivek Kopparthi (supply-chain management) and Chase Garrett (business management) to develop empathy-driven solutions for the care of newborn children through Neolight.
They developed a revolutionary therapeutic device using phototherapy for both home and hospital use, in treating jaundice in newborns. As students, the Neolight team competed in an ASU entrepreneurship and innovation challenge that offered seed funding and resources worth $100,000.
Neolight then went on to win prestigious awards, notably from the Flinn Foundation, and Rise of the Rest, and participated in Clinton Global Initiative to spread awareness of their project.
The social project
Today, it has more than $2 million in funding with six full-time and three part-time employees. It is working towards worldwide eradication of the occurrence of kernicterus — brain damage — in jaundiced babies by 2020, because they do not receive adequate care. Kernicterus can lead to cerebral palsy, hearing problems, and learning difficulties, leading to lifelong consequences.
Phototherapy or light treatment, is commonly used to treat neonatal jaundice. But conventional phototherapy technology requires frequent replacement of expensive light bulbs.
In rural and remote areas where there is a lack of steady access to electricity, the phototherapy equipment also experiences frequent breakdowns. Neolight’s approach to solving the problem was to develop an efficient yet affordable device for use in low-income and middle-income countries.
Neolight took shape from Palaniswamy’s identification of a need — improving medical care for jaundiced babies — and fulfilling that need through the Skylife device, a phototherapy-based treatment.
Palaniswamy had recognised the need in India long before he came to the US for graduate studies. He and his co-founders, with their drive and passion, learned entrepreneurship skills to take on this complex challenge.
The result is that they have improved the chances of a healthy life for numerous babies with jaundice around the world.