9:30am – Social

10am – Meeting

12pm – Lunch

Speaker will be Daniel Druhora and Burcin Becerik-Gerber.  They  will be introducing our members to one of USC’s newest and most unique educational programs.

The USC Viterbi School of Engineering has launched a design and innovation initiative that is bringing together university students and refugee students who have had their educations interrupted due to armed conflict, persecution, famine or environmental disasters.  They join as teams of innovators through a virtual collaborative exchange to design, build and implement solutions to some of the greatest challenges facing the world’s 68.5 million refugees and internally displaced people.  This new course focuses on engineering solutions for social good, taking students from seven USC schools to a close encounter with problems inside the refuge camps.  Over the course of two semesters, students work on a specific project, product or service that addresses the needs of refugees and local communities caught up in the crisis.  Ideas include improved sanitation, shelters, innovations to address the mental health and wellbeing of children in camps, local empowerment, education, access to information and security.