Photo Spotlights

First-year engineering honors students compete in the second annual Tip-a-Can event in which students designed a device—using everyday items and housed within a closed cylindrical container—that would automatically trigger the can to tip as near as possible to 60 seconds after the start of a timer. In addition to the performance of their contraptions, students were judged on creativity, ethics, teamwork and written essays describing their inventions.

Members of the RIT community gather around Ritchie and this year’s Formula SAE car at the unveiling ceremony, held on May 4, to celebrate 15 years of Formula at RIT. Twenty-seven members of the team will travel to Romeo, Mich., May 16-20, to compete in the national Formula SAE competition, held at the Ford Michigan Proving Grounds.

Wallace Library hosts quarterly “Library Reads to Margaret’s House” functions. About eight Margaret’s House kids enjoy a “monsters” based theme with two books being read and some fun crafts on May 8.

Jeff Hoover, left, Jessie Gmeinder and Chris Chaput, fifth-year mechanical engineering majors in the Kate Gleason College of Engineering, are part of a 10-person team that designed a wind-turbine-powered walkway light as a multidisciplinary senior-design project. The light, turbine and control box were permanently installed near F Lot and Cross Campus Drive last month.

Dan Bolinski is a fourth-year industrial design student who recently won the Industrial Design Society of America National Student Merit Award, one of only five awarded in the United States each year.

More than 150 first-year art and design students from RIT’s College of Imaging Arts and Sciences designed and constructed a wearable or portable design addressing a personal fear—ranging from a fear of germs, public speaking, or getting burned by hot coffee to a life without love. The 3-D projects are constructed of various materials including fabric, plastic and metal. Here, Shaun O’Brien explains The Houdini, a device used to escape a fire in a dorm room.

Bevier Gallery’s current exhibit of Graduate Thesis work is on display through May 9. One of the many imaginative pieces is this sculpture composed of nails by Maressa Tosto Merwarth.

Benjamin Harris, a marketing major in the E. Philip Saunders College of Business and a 2007 undergraduate commencement delegate, was one of 46 volunteers who recently led classes for students at Kodak Park School No. 41 on April 27. In the second annual event, each of 23 RIT students paired with an RIT alumnus or other business professional to introduce business concepts to first- through sixth-graders for a day.

Ron von Perlstein offers a sample of Geulah’s spicy tomato spread at the annual Taste of RIT on April 26. Proceeds from the food and beverage tasting benefit United Way.

Take Our Daughters & Sons To Work Day, coordinated by the RIT Women’s Center on April 26, offers Bookmaking & More at Wallace Library. Here, the Smith family works on creating books to take home.

The RIT community gathered April 27 to celebrate the dedication of the D. Robert Frisina Quadrangle at RIT. The quadrangle was created in honor of Dr. D. Robert Frisina, founding director of RIT’s National Technical Institute for the Deaf and a pioneer in the field of hearing loss and deafness for more than 40 years. Seated, left to right, are Sarah Gordon, NTID Student Congress president; Dr. Frisina, who currently is director of the RIT/NTID-based International Center for Hearing and Speech Research and an NTID professor of communication services; and RIT President Albert Simone. Standing is Alan Hurwitz, RIT vice president for NTID and CEO/dean of NTID.

The Technology Licensing Office and the Intellectual Property Committee sponsor their annual tribute to RIT’s inventors on April 25. President Simone, left, congratulates William Morris, a recipient of a Patent Plaque.