Humanitarian engineering

Research will focus on both the environmental and community impacts of vertically integrated mining operations

An e-waste recycling project in Bogotá, Columbia, gave Mines students an opportunity to not only practice their technical skills but also to learn from the communities they are supporting and understand the value of engaging local stakeholders in projects.

Since 2003, Mines’ Humanitarian Engineering program has taught scientists and engineers how to best partner with communities around the world and take a socio-technical approach to making a difference in the world.

After learning about the history, politics and economics of recycling in Colombia, a group of eleven students traveled to Bogota, Colombia during Spring Break to meet the women in person and test their assumptions and ideas on the ground.

Jessica Smith, professor of engineering, design and society, has spent years getting to know engineers in the field, learning about how they thought about their work in the broader context of their community and the planet.

What is exciting about our roadmap is that it considers community acceptance and sustainable development from the very first stages of design, rather than after a project has been fully planned,” said Jessica Smith, professor of engineering, design and society at Mines.

A delegation of students and faculty members from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia’s School of Mines in Medellín and the University of Texas at Arlington recently spent a week at Colorado School

Calls for greater corporate social responsibility place new demands on engineers’ everyday work, as Mines associate professor Jessica Smith demonstrates in a new book published by The MIT Press

The Humanitarian Engineering (HE) program at Colorado School of Mines has been awarded a $1.46 million National Science Foundation grant to support the retention and graduation of high-achieving students with demonstrated financial need.

The class, which focuses on sustainable development and earth resources, was selected by SDSN as a case study for integrating the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) into resource engineering education.