Student travel and networking grant for SMASIS 2008

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This grant will to provide support for student attendance, student networking and student mentoring activities for the first three years of the new American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) conference on Smart Materials, Adaptive Structures and Intelligent Systems (SMASIS). The objectives to be achieved through the use of support from the NSF will be 1) to promote student participation at the conference by encouraging participation of students from underrepresented communities, 2) to foster technical and intellectual exchange among student attendees; and 3) to develop a network of peers and mentors for current students who have a common interest in advancing the field of smart materials and adaptive structures. Activities to achieve objective 1 will include direct contact with student engineering groups at HBCUs and community college campuses that are located close to the conference venue each year and encouraging student attendance by covering student registration fees. Activities to achieve objective 2 will be a field trip for all student attendees to a venue near the conference such as a science center during which student networking will be facilitated. Activities to achieve objective 3 will include program activities to ensure students interact with leading professionals from industry, government and academia. The intellectual merit of the proposed activities lies in providing a forum to rigorously engage students as a community of peers in technical exchange about smart materials and adaptive structures. The broader impact of the proposed activities includes promoting participation in this technical subject matter of students from HBCUs and Community colleges, and in enriching student opportunities for mentoring and networking