Today, Thursday April 15, Michigan Tech’s Pavlis Honors College and the College of Engineering will be hosting Tech’s 21st Design Expo, the second to be held virtually. Remote judging opened on April 12, and opening remarks are set to start at eleven in the morning, followed by live presentations throughout the afternoon and an awards ceremony. Pre-registration for the event closed last Friday, but the awards ceremony is available to all at 3 p.m., and team project videos will become available after the event.
Over 1,000 Tech students from 23 Enterprise teams and 40 Senior Design teams will be presenting their work to a panel of judges consisting of Tech staff and faculty, as well as corporate representatives from various companies. The teams will be judged on factors such as organization, content, and delivery, with awards being given to the winning teams.
Due to the ongoing pandemic, this marks the second year that the event will be held entirely online. However, event coordinators are hopeful that the online platform will again allow the event to reach a wider audience, with participation across the United States and world being expected.
While the opening and closing ceremonies will take place over Zoom, the event presentations will be hosted with Gatherly, a program developed by students from Georgia Tech, which allows for users to move around freely from speaker to speaker in the same way that they would be able to do so in person. Judging took place earlier in the week via RocketJudge.com, where expo judges were able to view team videos which were prepared in advance.
Nearly 90 percent of project funding came from external sponsorships, a significant increase from the previous year. The Design Expo would not be the same without the generosity of its sponsors and University Scholarship, and it is another example of how Michigan Tech is an active contributor to its community and the world.
