Author: mklaarm

Drew Smiley

BSE ’20

Team Aquador was founded in 2017 with the goal of designing, building, and implementing a water purifying solution for communities in Ecuador affected by the 2016 earthquake. We intend to utilize renewable energy sources and recycled, discarded, and easily accessible material found in the region. The current design that we plan to build from is a disaster relief kit, containing compartments with the capability of filtering and purifying water and sterilizing medical equipment. We will begin this process by connecting with a small, coastal community so that we can create a system that is region-specific and efficient. In addition to designing our system, we plan to assemble educational materials on the importance of clean drinking water and safe food preparation and storage. Team Aquador’s website can be found at the following link: https://sites.google.com/umich.edu/team-aquador

Library Mentor: Paul Grochowski

Nocona Sanders

PhD ’21

The 2019 Washtenaw County Consensus Conference will be centered on water security, or the reliable access to clean water for health, livelihood, and production with low levels of waterborne risks. A variety of issues, including per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), nutrient runoff, aging infrastructure, and ineffective allocation of existing water resources threaten the area’s continued access to clean water. This consensus conference will gather a representative sample of community members from around Washtenaw County, give them information on the issues, let them directly talk with relevant experts, and then allow them to give their recommendations to policy makers. This process is unique in that it creates a structured, interactive dialogue between experts and the community empowering citizens to make informed statements on the issues directly affecting their community.

Library Mentor: Leena Lalwani

Mayela Rodriguez

MFA ’19

Educational institutions create “collections” as a way to validate certain scholarship. Although the UM Library boasts a variety of collections, it does not have one devoted to Latinx Studies. Just as libraries validate certain scholarship via their choice of collections, professors grant canonical status to texts when assembling “readers” (compilations of articles and book chapters used within the context of an academic course). I plan to challenge the concepts of “collection” and “reader” by inviting the University of Michigan Latinx community to make readers from crowdsourced texts identified by surveying the Latinx campus community for selections of Latinx texts that they deem important. Readers will be bound with cardboard covers, alluding to the tradition of Latin American cartoneras (a form that makes literary publishing and distribution more accessible). The final readers will be displayed on a custom-built mobile “Latinx Library” cart within the lobbies of Shapiro Library and Hatcher Graduate Library. The “Latinx Library” will function as a visible space for Latinx scholarship where students can peruse and borrow readers through a lending system.

Library Mentors: Jamie Vander Broek and Edras Rodriguez-Torres

Christopher Pumford

BA ’19

Social media has dramatically altered society in a relatively short period of time. Unfortunately, our generation’s inexperience with this technology has also created some “growing pains.” At present, there is no organization on campus to address the effect social media has had on students’ mental wellbeing, productivity, and other aspects of life. Enter the Engage Initiative. We are a student-led grassroots initiative with the mission of helping fellow students at the University of Michigan optimize their relationship with social media by discarding negative habits associated with the technology. Our operations are centered around three strategies:
1. To develop a fluid curriculum for educating students on how to properly use social media
2. To teach our curriculum in small interactive seminars around campus
3. To implement mass marketing initiatives around campus
Our Initiative is currently addressing the needs of fellow Michigan students, but once we establish ourselves we expect to expand our outreach to nearby public schools and other university campuses.

Library Mentor: Angie Oehrli

Leanna Papp

PhD ’22

The Social Experiences Across Time Study (SEATS) aims to investigate the social and sexual experiences of female undergraduates at the University of Michigan. Specifically, we are interested in how students navigate social life and related social situations, and how their engagement in college social life may change over time. By focusing on environments that many college students participate in, such as parties and bars, we hope to better understand the many perspectives on various social interactions. SEATS will follow undergraduate women in the class of 2022 throughout their college career at UM.

Library Mentor: Meredith Kahn

Madeleine Messinger

BFA ’18

For my Senior Integrative Project in the Stamps School of Art & Design, I will take on the roles of “artist”, “historian”, and “curator”. I plan to create a 6’ x 10’ large scale multimedia artist book that will tell the marginal (or lesser known) stories of Ann Arbor’s history. Some narratives that I may explore involve the origin of Ann Arbor’s name and the shifting demographics of the area. For example, people may be unaware of the demographic shift that has occurred in Ann Arbor, specifically the gentrification of the Kerrytown historical district. It’s important to memorialize these stories which could easily be forgotten or disregarded so that past mistakes are not repeated. My research and updates on my project can be found at www.madeleinemessinger.com/ip-blog

Library Mentors: Jamie Vander Broek and Julie Herrada

Weiwei Lu

MA ’19

My project is to develop a series of online visual fiction games in Chinese, presenting a diversified foot-binding experience of women in the middle and late imperial China (960-1912), and thereby complicating game players’ understanding of large concepts such as gender, modernity, and free will. The games are intended to serve a community of Chinese players who are not interested in learning history from books, and who find the premodern era distant, alien, and unrelatable. There are three major goals, namely, to reject the popular and simplistic stereotype of ancient Chinese women as hapless victims of their men’s morbid taste, to popularize the studies of history and archaeology through a quasi-immersive gaming experience, and to relate the topic of foot-binding to modern social phenomena and offer my own critiques.

Library Mentor: Liangyu Fu

Lixi Liu

PhD ’21

Within the last several years, the Chinese government has implemented strict new waste management regulations for Chinese pig farms. Our project team has partnered with a rural pig farmer, Mr. Zhu, in Anhui Province, China. Our team will research and recommend environmentally and financially sustainable waste management solutions that will help Mr. Zhu’s farm remain compliant. During a summer 2018 assessment trip, we found inadequate storage capacity for pig slurry and issues of wastewater runoff. We also conducted a local community survey and found that local residents are concerned with odor and wastewater runoff from the farm. We will design a treatment system for Mr. Zhu to address these issues by the end of 2018. The library mini-grant will help fund a follow-up trip in summer 2019, during which we will assess and evaluate the solutions that Mr. Zhu will have implemented. We will also conduct a follow-up community survey to confirm that broader community concerns have been addressed.

Library Mentor: Lori Tschirhart

Emily Legleitner

BFA ’19

How do you know? will be an art installation of large scale copper etching self-portraits on paper, accompanied by the publication of personal accounts, research and relevant resources for women and victims of intimate partner abuse. This project is a culmination of several years of study, conducted in an effort to rebuild and strengthen my personal notion of identity, self-confidence, and independence as a survivor of emotional abuse and intimate partner violence. The project will explore how experiences in intimate relationships influence the development of the psyche, particularly in adolescence and for women. Adolescence is a vital moment in the development of one’s identity, and is also a particularly vulnerable time in a person’s life. The opinions and influence of others can greatly affect and manipulate the way in which an individual perceives themselves and in turn, how they continue to behave and interact with others into adulthood. My thesis work will unpack how my own experiences may have impacted the ways in which I distinguish my individuality and identity now, and conduct myself in relationships as a young adult.

Library Mentor: Jamie Vander Broek

Thomas Laub

BFA ’19

Runyonland Productions is proud to present “A Night of MYTHS & HYMNS.” Using selections curated from Adam Guettel’s song cycle centered around Grecian mythology, MYTHS & HYMNS, we are developing an entirely new, dynamic piece of art that ties in modern religion to inform what influences our decisions and beliefs today. We are collaborating with a local imam, priest, rabbi, and scholar of Grecian mythology to create an educational, emotional, impactful performance that highlights how much we all have in common and promote tolerance and acceptance. We will be performing A Night of MYTHS & HYMNS twice on the evening of March 30th in the gorgeous University of Michigan Museum of Art. The performances will be completely free, with professors, local political and religious leaders, and students attending. Through this endeavor, we aim to create a new, innovative piece of art that will bring the community together through shared understanding.

Library Mentors: Evyn Kropf and Zach Quint