In Their Own Words: 2018 Internships
Master in Design Engineering (MDE) students spent the summer of 2018 exploring a variety of issues and industries, from the intersection of privacy and technology to the future of work. In their owns words, the experiences made for an amazing summer.
Vish Srivastava
Business Designer Intern, IDEO.org
This past summer, I worked at IDEO.org in their San Francisco studio, and served as a Business Designer on a project team working on family planning for young adolescent girls in Ethiopia. My work included conducting interviews with various program stakeholders (such as regional health officers and other public health leaders), observing the program in the field (as shown in the image above), and modeling out the operational scale-up across different regions. I learned a ton about the nuances and complexities of working in the social sector and loved the opportunity to stretch my design skillset. Plus, I got to experience Ethiopia’s amazing culture (and its food)!
Saad Rajan
Design Strategist Intern, WeWork
This past summer, I worked as a Design Strategist for WeWork in their New York HQ. The role was cross-disciplinary between the research and design teams strategizing how to improve the applicability of research across the organization. Through the project, I interviewed teams, led cross-functional workshops, and created and piloted design concepts that varied across scales (digital, service and spatial). Through the experience, I learned a ton about the future of work, innovative technologies within the industry and practiced the design-thinking approach. And of course, the culture and environment at WeWork’s office was incredible!
Kiran Wattamwar
Privacy and Civil Liberties Engineering Intern, Palantir
Palantir’s software enables analysts at both government and commercial agencies to leverage their data more powerfully through data integration. During my internship at the Privacy and Civil Liberties Team at Palantir, I worked on improving our auditing infrastructure to make auditing capabilities useful for preventative security rather than just proactive investigation. In concert with this technical project, I developed policy suggestions for government entities regarding the EU PNR Directive as it pertains to data management, collection and retention with Palantir.
Jenny Fan
Interaction Design Intern, IDEO
This past summer, I worked as an interaction design intern in IDEO’s Palo Alto office, where I primarily partnered with Ford’s Greenfield Labs to imagine and develop the future of goods and services that could be supported by autonomous vehicles. The summer was spent doing the human-centered design that IDEO is best known for, with a mix of research on emerging technologies as well as the humans who would be impacted by them. In my spare time, I got to help work on creative projects that showed off the best of what IDEO’s designers have to offer, from AR-powered puzzle games to constructing giant-scale mechatronic artwork.