A bold initiative revives MIT’s hands-on learning ethos: NEET scholars build a solar-powered charging station for the campus
MIT’s New Engineering Education Transformation (NEET) program recently brought together students from multiple disciplines to design and install a solar-powered charging station. Nestled in a quiet campus courtyard, the station offers climate-friendly power for phones, laptops, and tablets to the MIT community.
This project marked a milestone: a cross-departmental team of undergraduates designed, created, and installed a green technology artifact for public use as part of a class taken for credit, according to Amitava “Babi” Mitra, NEET’s founding executive director.
The effort embodies NEET’s core mission of interdisciplinary, cross-departmental, project-driven study with experiential learning at its heart. Launched in 2017 to reimagine undergraduate engineering education at MIT, NEET aims to empower students to address complex societal challenges that span multiple fields.
The solar-charging project is a key component of NEET’s Climate and Sustainability Systems (CSS) thread, one of four study pathways the program offers. The class, 22.03/3.0061 (Introduction to Design Thinking and Rapid Prototyping), teaches the hands-on techniques behind the station’s creation—laser cutting, 3D printing, computer-aided design (CAD), electronics prototyping, microcontroller programming, and composites manufacturing.
Team members came from chemical engineering, materials science and engineering, mechanical engineering, and nuclear science and engineering.
“I was especially drawn to the early stage of the project, when ideation and brainstorming took center stage in ways I hadn’t seen before,” says AaronDe Leon, a nuclear science and engineering major focusing on clean energy. He notes that the early sessions highlighted how personal design choices influence user experience—an aspect often overlooked in traditional engineering courses.
The station’s forest-inspired design aims to evoke organic connectivity, featuring tree-trunk-inspired supports, oyster-mushroom-shaped desk space, and four solar panels curved to resemble a forest canopy’s undulating silhouette. The tree-trunk components were created from flax fiber-based composites, a novel material developed through experiments aimed at finding more sustainable alternatives to conventional composites.
The team also discussed a practical issue: limited device-charging options hindered students from studying outdoors. The new desk space is meant to support comfortable outdoor work while powering devices with renewable energy.
Celestina Pint, another CSS student, joined NEET in search of an open, interdisciplinary approach to climate and sustainability beyond her materials science and engineering major. “I like the interdisciplinary aspect,” she says.
The project offered abundant opportunities for cross-disciplinary learning that go beyond theory, notes Nathan Melenbrink, NEET lecturer and the class’s lead instructor for the CSS thread. The students even navigated real-world bureaucracy: the charging station required approvals from more than a dozen entities, including campus police, MIT’s insurance provider, and the facilities department.
Fabrication also brought unexpected design-implementation challenges, requiring on-the-fly adjustments. Pint recalls comparing the final installation with the initial design and noticing both similarities and differences.
Tyler Ea, a fifth-year mechanical engineering student who joined last year and now serves as a teaching assistant for the class, emphasizes the project’s unique value: students gain ownership of a tangible product that embodies their ideas—from concept to final build.
Even first-year students could engage with the concept. In SP.248 (The NEET Experience), newcomers analyzed the solar station after mastering systems engineering basics in the discovery course, proposing refinements to the design.
Melenbrink frames campus-based, student-built installations as a cherished MIT tradition waiting to be revived. The CSS project, he says, resonates with that spirit: a visible, collaborative, student-driven initiative that brings prototypes to campus life.
Elsa Olivetti, MIT’s materials science and engineering professor and strategic adviser to the MIT Climate and Sustainability Consortium, views the station as a concrete example of solution-focused learning. “This local renewable-energy project proves that the campus community can contribute through hands-on development,” she asserts. “Students do not need to wait to graduate or join the workforce to make a difference.”
Building on this momentum, this year’s Introduction to Design Thinking and Rapid Prototyping class will fabricate and install a new solar-powered charging station featuring a fresh design. De Leon welcomes the autonomy NEET grants students, noting there was never a rigid prescription from professors. “The freedom to explore as deeply as desired and to make design decisions along the way was invaluable,” he says.
