Native students' research stands out at national conference
The American Indian Science and Engineering Society (AISES) National Conference is the premier event for Native American and indigenous STEM professionals and students, attracting over 2,000 members and American and Canadian attendees from as far away as Alaska and Hawaii. Yet, at this year's October 2020 three-day event, held virtually due to the pandemic, the research of two Ohio State students stood out from the crowd.
Michael Charles earned 2nd place in the graduate poster research competition for his work titled "Developing an Optimization Framework to Achieve Campus Carbon Neutrality with both Technological and Ecological Solutions." Charles was awarded an NSF ASSIST grant to attend the conference.
Michael Charles is a longtime advocate of integrating native knowledge with technological solutions in the belief that such a marriage is not only a win-win, but crucial in addressing worldwide ecological challenges of paramount importance. He has been active with the United Nations' Indigenous Peoples' Platform and in 2017 served as a representative for Native peoples at the 23rd annual UN Climate Negotiations' Conference of the Parties (COP 23) in Bonn, Germany, where he participated in speech-making and wrote the final text on the need for providing a platform for indigenous people and local communities in discussions about climate change. In 2019, he led the first U.S. indigenous youth delegation at COP 25 in Madrid, Spain.
In 2019, he was awarded a Dreamstarter Grant from the American Indian Youth Foundation to work with students at high schools on his reservation with the aim of increasing indigenous representation in higher education.
Charles is an advisee of Professor Bhavik Bakshi and a member of Bakshi's Process Systems Engineering Group.
The AISES conference spotlighted another Ohio State student whose efforts earned special recognition. Anna Grondolsky won the undergraduate oral research presentation. Anna, a freshman at Ohio State, presented her work on Reversible Fuel Cell technology that she did at Kamehameha Schools Kapālama High School, an all Native Hawaiian high school that has a strong research program.
The AISES conference is open to Native high school and college students, educators, professionals, tribal nations and tribal enterprises, universities, corporations, and government agencies.
A list of all winners can be found on this aises website.
