The School of Engineering’s newest student design club, Innovate, Design, Sustain (IDS), seeks to uncover innovative engineering and scientific solutions to create a more sustainable environment on campus and throughout the Okanagan.
Spearheaded by three undergraduate students, the new club was recently registered under the UBC Okanagan Students’ Union.
“We started this club is because, as engineering students, we are highly interested in putting our engineering and design skills into sustainable applications,” explains Sayra Gorgani, a third-year electrical engineering student. “We have been looking for opportunities that would allow us to come together and work on sustainable design solutions, but we realized no such student clubs/associations existed at UBC Okanagan.”
According to Gorgani, the club has been met by an enthusiastic response from faculty, staff, and students both in and outside the School of Engineering. “Regardless of their faculty, we encourage every student to join if they have an interest in making an actual change in our environment. Being a new club, we recognize the value of every idea, so this gives every student member the opportunity to contribute equally and make significant impact.”
Gorgani along with Ashwin Ramesh, secretary, and Eric Laksmono, treasurer, have been hard at work strategizing. The club hopes to start official meetings in term 2 (January 2021). Some of their proposed projects include installing solar powered benches around the campus to charge smartphones (pending UBC approval), implementing scientific solutions to better manage food waste and e-waste on campus, creating and promoting reusable bags and gift wrapping on campus, and more!
“As students, we are passionate about sustainability and protecting our environment, so a group like IDS will help us gain some important experience, and connect with like-minded colleagues,” says Ashwin.
Laksmono couldn’t agree more. “We started this club to allow students to gain design experience with sustainable projects, as well as to benefit the whole community of UBC Okanagan with our projects.”
IDS will start their meetings with student members in January 2021. If you are interested to learn more, email IDS at idsubco@gmail.com or follow ISD on Instagram page @idsubco for updates.
So great to find this group! I am the coordinator of Kelowna’s Sustainable Development Challenge, a youth platform focused on impacting the Global Goals. You can read about our work here: https://sustainabledevelopmentchallenge.com/ I have a high school student who wants to do a presentation on ECO Bricks. https://www.ecobricks.org/ This is a low tech answer to the excess plastics problem in our environment and a way to responsibly utilize its benefits. Our student wants to educate people on how to make the bricks and then she needs a good building blueprint for a bench or other useable or sellable item that can be made sustainably. Many people internationally have made things with the ebricks using cob or adobe etc. Her focus is on teaching people about plastic waste, showing them how to make the bricks and bringing the community together to create with them. The engineering part of what to make, and how to implement the bottle bricks into a viable product using a green compound is where we need help! Think like a spaghetti bridge building competition in your dept. except with eco bricks! If you would like to discuss this more then please contact me asap!