KSU Student Chapter of the IEEE EMBS as a Focal Point for Senior Design Projects to Aid Children with Disabilities

PI：Warren，Steven，Evans，Shelby and Natarajan，Balasubramaniam提案编号：10067740 中等工程专业的高年级学生提供了多样化的技能，可以解决残疾儿童面临的无数生活质量问题。 在这个层面上的多学科设计项目可以帮助残疾儿童寻求茁壮成长的环境范围内的日常生活，健康监测和教育活动：教室，家庭和社区。 这项拟议的合作的总体目标是建立一个可持续的关系之间的堪萨斯州立大学（KSU）工程学院（COE）和在威奇托，堪萨斯，在那里的KSU学生的设计人才是针对严重残疾儿童在Heartspring所面临的挑战的解决方案（其中大多数人患有自闭症谱系障碍），与他们一对一合作的辅助教育工作者，以及指导这些项目的临床和行政人员。 七个目标支持这一目标：-定义高级设计项目，通过促进日常生活活动，改善学生健康和加速教育，提高学生和帕拉生活质量。立即在Heartspring服务的教室，家庭和社区环境中实施这些工程解决方案。强调通过量化当地环境，健康状况和教育进步中的动态来提高照顾者对残疾儿童状况的认识的项目。寻求解决方案，帮助减少对辅助教育工作者的照顾负担，从自动收集和传输学生数据开始。将高级项目与KSU现有的结构化课程和独立的特殊主题课程相结合，以有效地提供这些经验，并保持学生和教师的购买。通过IEEE医学和生物学工程学会（EMBS）的KSU学生分会的漏斗项目，将来自所有COE部门的学生聚集在一起，并作为有影响力的多学科项目的聚集中心。传播这些努力产生的设计和相关的临床有效性结果，以最大限度地发挥这些投资对残疾人社区的影响。 从智力价值的角度来看，这种方法是及时和恰当的。 残疾儿童的健康和安全可以通过定制和现成的移动的无线技术提高效率和生产力来改善，这些技术通常应用于其他商业部门。 这种普遍的技术工具可以嵌入学习和生活环境中，以帮助了解情况并减轻护理负担。 在较短的时间内取得更好的结果是不可避免的。 关于更广泛的影响，这一努力将（a）加强KSU EMBS学生分会，（B）产生KSU COE兴奋有关生物医学项目，（c）提高高级设计经验的质量和影响，因为设计将立即在预期的Heartspring应用环境中进行测试，（d）作为一个招聘工具，以促进女学生参与KSU COE计划，以及（e）增加残疾儿童参与研究，这是一个在多种社会和研究背景下代表性不足的群体。 这一努力也将不可避免地导致更大的Heartspring/KSU努力，这将增加技术资源，用于具有类似功能独立需求的其他人群。 该团队的希望是利用技术作为“成果力量倍增器”，以帮助残疾服务社区（1）降低特殊教育的不成比例的成本，（2）增加可用于满足日益增长的需求的资源基础，以及（3）提供可以快速实施和部署的规模解决方案。

PI: Warren, Steven, Evans, Shelby and Natarajan, BalasubramaniamProposal Number: 10067740 Seniors in secondary engineering programs offer a diverse skill set that can address a myriad of quality-of-life issues faced by disabled children. Multidisciplinary design projects at this level can assist with activities of daily living, health monitoring, and education within the confines of the environments where disabled children seek to thrive: classrooms, homes, and communities. The overall goal of this proposed collaboration is to establish a sustainable relationship between the Kansas State University (KSU) College of Engineering (COE) and Heartspring in Wichita, KS, where design talents of KSU students are directed toward solutions to challenges faced by severely disabled children at Heartspring (most of whom have an Autism Spectrum Disorder), the paraeducators that work with them one-on-one, and the clinical and administrative staff that guide those programs. Seven objectives support this goal:- Define senior design projects that enhance student and para quality of life by facilitating activities of daily living, improving student health, and accelerating education.- Implement these engineering solutions immediately within the classroom, home, and community environments served by Heartspring.- Emphasize projects that increase caregivers' situational awareness for disabled children by quantifying dynamics within their local environment, state of health, and educational progress.- Seek solutions that help to reduce the burden of care imposed upon paraeducators, starting with automated collection and transmission of student date.- Align senior projects with existing structured courses and independent, special topics courses at KSU to efficiently deliver these experiences and maintain buy-in from students and instructors.- Funnel projects through the KSU Student Chapter of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society (EMBS) to bring together students from all COE departments and serve as a rallying hub for impactful multidisciplinary projects.- Disseminate the designs produced by these efforts and the associated clinical effectiveness results so as to maximize the impact of these investments on the disabled community. From an Intellectual Merit viewpoint, this approach is timely and apt. The health and safety of disabled children can be improved by efficiency and productivity increases offered by custom and off-the-shelf mobile, wireless technologies usually applied in other business sectors. Such pervasive technology tools can be embedded in learning and living environments to assist with situational awareness and reduce the burden of care. Improved outcomes in shorter periods of time are inevitable. Regarding Broader Impact, this effort will (a) strengthen the KSU EMBS student chapter, (b) generate KSU COE excitement regarding biomedical projects, (c) increase the quality and impact of senior design experiences since design will be immediately tested in the intended Heartspring application environment, (d) serve as a recruiting tool to foster the participation of female students in KSU COE programs, and (e) increase research participation of disabled children, an underrepresented group in multiple societal and research contexts. This effort will also inevitably lead to larger Heartspring/KSU efforts that will increase technology resources for use with other populations that have similar functional independence needs. The hope of this team is to use technology as an "outcomes force multiplier" to help the disability services community (1) reduce the disproportionate cost of special education, (2) increase the resource base available to meet the growing need, and (3) provide solutions of scale that can be implemented and deployed quickly.