A proud student shows off the flashlight he just made in a SEED Education workshop run by the D-Lab Kolkata team during their IAP trip. (Photo courtesy of Brooke A. Jarrett on Flickr.)
Instructor(s)
Amy J. Smith
Prof. Bishwapriya Sanyal
Victor Grau Serrat
MIT Course Number
EC.701J / 11.025J / 11.472J
As Taught In
Fall 2009
Level
Undergraduate / Graduate
Course Description
Course Features
Course Description
D-Lab Development addresses issues of technological improvements at the micro level for developing countries—in particular, how the quality of life of low-income households can be improved by adaptation of low cost and sustainable technologies. Discussion of development issues as well as project implementation challenges are addressed through lectures, case studies, guest speakers and laboratory exercises. Students form project teams to partner with mostly local level organizations in developing countries, and formulate plans for an IAP site visit. (Previous field sites include Ghana, Brazil, Honduras and India.) Project team meetings focus on developing specific projects and include cultural, social, political, environmental and economic overviews of the countries and localities to be visited as well as an introduction to the local languages.
