Outreach & Service
Biomedical engineering is, by its nature, a way for engineers to improve the human condition—an embodiment of the phrase ‘service to society.’ Biomedical engineers are constantly improving the state of health care and making new, important advances in disease detection and treatment.
Duke’s BME educational program features several truly distinctive opportunities for our students to engage in hands-on learning and to make a difference in the lives of others.
Center for Global Women’s Health Technologies (GWHT)
Led by Nimmi Ramanujam, the Center for Global Women’s Health Technologies (GWHT) provides multidisciplinary and multicultural experiences to motivate Duke students to tackle global challenges in women’s health with their engineering education. At the research level, the center’s accomplished faculty and scientists also work to increase research, training and education in women’s diseases with an initial focus on women’s cancers and maternal-fetal health. One recent example saw the development of a low-cost, smartphone-based colposcope to screen for cervical cancer in low-resource settings.
Ignite
Based on the idea of human-centered design, the Ignite curriculum teaches middle and high school students how to engage with their own community to better understand and solve local needs and problems. Participants work together to brainstorm solutions, develop a prototype and then iterate the design based on feedback. In the six years since its creation, more than 2,500 students across Guatemala, Kenya and India have participated in program. And in 2020, a local version of the program was launched in Durham.
Outreach Design Education Program (ODE)
ODE is an NIH-funded set of programs that introduces pre-college students, particularly those from underrepresented backgrounds, to the engineering design process. Through engineering exercises, participants grow their STEM identify by becoming the drivers of biomedical innovation. ODE hosts three major components:
- Summer design camp for high school students
- Design hackathon for middle school students
- Design instructional development program with middle and high school teachers
Duke Research in Engineering Program (DukeREP)
DukeREP is a seven-week summer research program for high school students. By giving students experience working in a research lab setting, the program aims to inspire them to pursue academic and professional careers in STEM.