TUESDAY, M ARCH 11, 2014
Volume 95, Issue 23
Eight hope to join ASI board Two students will represent each college on board DENA HAMEDANI Daily Titan
A debate between candidates for Associated Students Inc. Board of Directors positions stirred up some friendly competition among eight Cal State Fullerton students who hope to represent their college on the board next year. The hopefuls debated for two hours at Becker Amphitheater, and students were given the opportunity to ask the candidate questions. The ASI board consists of representatives from each of the eight colleges on campus. Students in each college elect two representatives to serve on the ASI Board of Directors. Once elected, directors are responsible for setting policies for ASI, approving all funding allocations to programs and preserving student interests. Neha Ansari, a 20-yearold biochemistry major, is the current board director for the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics (NSM) and would ultimately like to come back for another term to continue the momentum in the NSM department. “As a (part of the) board of directors, I think how I would approach that (diversity) is to never feel that you are above someone or that you can’t talk to someone, but actually go and talk to your constituents and try to understand them, and try to understand their backgrounds and how you can advocate on their behalfs,” Ansari said. Although the panel of hopeful candidates consisted of students from various backgrounds and majors, the debates seemed more conversational than contentious. Each of the eight candidates offered somewhat differing goals and objectives for the university, but ultimately shared a deep appreciation for the school and a desire to help future students. Ciara Redmond, 21, a candidate for the College of Communications, said she would gauge student interests as a way to help ensure students excel at CSUF. “I really became passionate about Cal State Fullerton through my involvements here,” Redmond said. “I’m a Titan ambassador, a campus tour guide on campus, and through that I learned about all of the amazing opportunities Cal State Fullerton offers a lot of students that I believe many of our students aren’t aware of, and I really want to spread that awareness.” SEE BOARD, 2
BRANDON HICKS / Daily Titan This hands-free crutch designed by senior mechanical engineering students at Cal State Fullerton mimics the natural motion of the leg. Hands-free crutches are intended for people who have suffered injuries to their ankles, but still require use of their hands or are otherwise unable to use traditional crutches.
Mechanical engineering students team up to develop new crutch SAMUEL MOUNTJOY Daily Titan
Five mechanical engineering students are trying their hand at constructing a better hands-free crutch. The team will go from a three-dimensional computer model to a working, usable product in just a few months. Improving on commercially available, hands-free crutches that look more like a pirate’s peg leg, their design uses a natural swinging motion to mimic the leg’s natural movement. Hands-free crutches are used by people who have had their ankles injured and require the use of their hands or otherwise cannot use traditional crutches. However, the team said, products on the market today are unnatural and disorienting. “The main goal is to come up with the natural trajectory
SAMUEL MOUNTJOY / Daily Titan The team poses with various iterations of hands-free crutches Larry Tlilayatzi (left) holds a crutch designed by seniors last year. Mike Villavecer (middle) holds part of this year’s project. Justin Chin (second from right) holds Texas A&M’s design. Salar Nostrat holds the iWalk Free, the product the team hopes to improve on.
of the ankle,” said Justin Chin, a mechanical engineering major. The device, a mechanical engineering senior project, attaches the thigh and knee of the user with the knee bent at
a 90 degree angle. It will have a swinging joint below the wearer’s knee that will mimic the range of motion seen in the human knee. The team used a treadmill to record how users would walk
with the crutch and employed motion-capture technology to analyze the biomechanics of how the human leg moves. “We don’t really cover that in mechanical engineering, so we’ve had to do a lot of research on that to figure out how does the human leg move,” said Mike Villavecer, the team leader. They’ve been analyzing the mechanics of human motion to make sure that they can dial in the spring tension of the knee, the weighting of the ankle and other aspects of the leg so it mimics the natural feel of the human leg as much as possible. Currently, there is no product on the market like the one the team is developing, but others have created similar projects. Texas A&M students fabricated a leg that wraps around the thigh and swings next to the wearer’s leg. SEE CRUTCH, 2
Fueling the drive toward an innovative future Evan Ewing, 22, is crowdsourcing to fund his class project GINA VAN STRATTEN Daily Titan
Cal State Fullerton courses require students to complete student projects that showcase their abilities in their major. For one senior, that project involves driving in a car and flying a plane. “One of the final projects is creating a short video, 30 seconds, about a product,” said Evan Ewing, a 22-yearold business administration
major. “It’s specifically sort of a promotional advertisement.” Ewing decided to use Kickstarter, a crowd-funding site, to finance his Visual Marketing 450 course senior project, which will cost thousands of dollars. Kickstarter is a platform where people can post their ideas or projects and set a goal for the amount of funding needed. Once a project is posted on the site, people can go to the website and directly support a vision they believe in or are interested in. Since Kickstarter officially launched in 2009, 5.8
million people pledged $1 billion and funded 57,000 projects, according to the company’s website. Ewing’s campaign is one of those thousands. He picked the Nissan GT-R project because he wants to promote how the high-performance vehicle can compete with sports cars like Lamborghini but at half the price. “(Nissan GT-R) is widely recognized in the car community as the most affordable ‘super-car,’” Ewing said. “If you look at it, it just looks like a normal Nissan, so it doesn’t get a lot of hype that I think it deserves.”
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Ewing said he saw the project as an opportunity to promote his “favorite car.” Ewing said he needs the money for multiple complex aspects of his project and wants to rent the Nissan GT-R for the project. Ewing also said he is a pilot, so he wants to buy cameras and a drone to mount on the bottom of the plane for aerial footage. “That’s kind of the big kicker to the project,” Ewing said. “We’re going to get crazy aerial footage out in the mountains.” Kickstarter is designed in such a way that requires a project to reach its goal for
funding in order to actually receive the money. Ewing realizes the possibility that the project may not receive full funding, but is hoping that does not become a reality. “I’ll just find something else cool, but this is really where I had my heart for the project,” Ewing said. Ewing said he will use “every single penny” of the $2,500 needed if the project receives full funding. He has created incentives for people who fund his project on Kickstarter. SEE PROJECT, 6
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