Team:SBS SH 112144/Public Engagement

Forum at the Bund Center

On the afternoon of July 21, we held a forum at the Bund Center, Shanghai. To begin with, we introduced our project, the background of the problem, and the approach we took to resolve the problem. Then, we watched a video sent from our PI, Prof. Xiao, conveying his high expectation for the team from Cornell University.

After that, the experienced cyanobacteria researcher, Prof. Wang from Fudan University, talked about the existing methods in coping with cyanobacteria- introducing competing species, building algae-water separation station, and salvaging manually, etc. Right after, Mr. Luo from a last year’s outstanding collegiate team, “Shanghaitech 2017”, shared his experience on how to accomplish the research step

For the next part of the event, our team enthusiastically presented a well-prepared talent show. Thanks to our talented team members, our performance, including traditional cross talking, singing and dancing, won large rounds of applause

Approaching the epilogue of the event, we organized a fund-raising activity at which we sold our uniquely designed items, such as T-shirts with our team logo. In the end, we raised 5903 RMB from the activity, which would later be used to support our project. Through this activity, not only were we able to lay a financial foundation for our subsequent activities, but we were also able to publicize on our project.

Reception at the Xuhui Center Hospital

In order to hear from more people their opinion on our project and spread our idea more widely, we held a promotion reception at Xuhui Center Hospital. We invited people to learn what we are doing. And if they would like to help, they would put a sticker on our promotion poster. We put the basic summary, as well as the usage, necessity, benefits, disadvantages of our project on the board for people to view. We also held a Q&A part during which our student representatives would answer any question from the visitors. Lots of patients in the hospital participated, and they said that this would be a very worthwhile project if it actually comes true. Amazingly, we got 325 stickers in this 2 hours activity. Some patients even took time to scan our QR code and filled out our survey questions.