Contact: Amy Hewes
805-756-6402
ahewes@calpoly.edu
Cal Poly Students Win National Award
for Design Benefiting Disabled Workers
SAN LUIS OBISPO – Mechanical engineering students Paula Gijon and Chittayong (Jao) Surakitbanharn have won a national award and a $10,000 prize for designing a device to aid disabled hospitality industry employees.
The duo won the NISH National Scholar Award. The award recognizes the design of devices that improve access to the workplace for people with disabilities.
The students designed and built a device that helps disabled people roll silverware and napkins together to make place settings for restaurants.
The first place award comes with a $10,000 prize for the students and a matching grant to the Cal Poly Mechanical Engineering Department.
The National Scholar Award for Workplace Innovation and Design was founded by NISH to encourage the development of creative technological solutions to barriers that prevent people with disabilities from entering or advancing in the workplace. The National Scholar Award is open to any college student or student team at the graduate or undergraduate level.
NISH is a national nonprofit agency whose mission is to create employment opportunities for people with severe disabilities by securing federal contracts for its network of community-based, nonprofit agencies.
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