April 11th, Virginia Tech KTU exhibitors

"Redesigning the World Around Us"

Four facets of human factors will be exhibited. 'Safety' will consist of a slideshow of numerous workers performing hazardous tasks; participants must play a Where's Waldo-type game to identify multiple hazards and dangers in the working environment. 'Technology' will have one of the members showcasing and demonstrating their LEAP motion capture technology which participants can interact with. 'Heuristics' will have users undergo methods of calculating Fitt's Law in pointing and interaction exercises. Finally, 'Cognition' will have participants engaging in multitasking tasks to provide examples of multiple resource theory and difficulty in engagingin similar tasks. 

Human Factors and Ergonomics Society

The Society's mission is to promote the discovery and exchange of knowledge concerning the characteristics of human beings that are applicable to the design of systems and devices of all kinds.  We further serious consideration of knowledge about the assignment of appropriate functions for humans and machines, whether people serve as operators, maintainers, or users in the system. Furthermore, we advocate systematic use of such knowledge to achieve compatibility in the design of interactive systems of people, machines, and environments to ensure their effectiveness, safety, and ease of performance. The VT student chapter is one of the largest in the nation; winning gold chapter status continuously for numerous years.

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"Experience Earthquake Engineering: Be the Engineer"

The EERI VT student chapter would like to participate in the Kids' Tech University event in order to spread awareness and knowledge of how today's structures are designed to with stand earthquakes. There are two subjects we would like expose the participants to that are related to our mission. The first is the geotechnical, what happens to ground during an earthquake, and we would like to set up a demonstration of this phenomenon. The second is the structural, what happens to a building during an earthquake, and we have a shake table that students can interact with, where in they can build and test their own structures. Our Civil and Environmental Engineering department has all necessary equipment to run both activities. 

Earthquake Engineering Research Institute Student Chapter of Virginia 

The EERI/VT Student Chapter aims to contribute to the dissemination of knowledge pertaining to research and professional activities associated with earthquake engineering and with the student community at Virginia Tech (VT). Additionally, the Chapter seeks to encourage the interaction and scientific collaboration among VT students and professionals interested in earthquake-related research. Providing new scenarios where students can learn from each other’s research will advance the quality of their work while giving them a more comprehensive understanding of the field