Inheritance: An Interdisciplinary, Multimedia Exhibition and Learn by Doing Experience
Martine Lappé, Social Sciences
Laura Krifka, Art & Design
Lela Shahrzad Welch, Art & Design
The stakes of the current social, political, and environmental moment in the United States are significant. Decisions made at the federal level are actively impacting states, local communities, and individuals in ways that are not only shaping lived experiences today but will likely have lasting impacts for generations to come. This CET Seed Grant supports scholars, artists, and students in the development of a collaborative Learn by Doing experience, student show, and final professional multimedia exhibition titled “Inheritance.” The project aims to foster new forms of community by inviting scholars, artists, and viewers to connect to pasts, presents, and possible futures by engaging with materials that combine technology, art, and the social sciences in innovative and provocative ways. The final exhibition will take place in Los Angeles and feature a renowned local artist and professionally curated works that examine how power, identity, history, and community are embedded within and shaped by various visions and lived experiences of inheritance. This exhibition will explicitly build on the cross-disciplinary student learning experience and showcase that take place at Cal Poly. These connections between pedagogical practice, creative process, and shared experience will advance expressive technologies at a time when myriad forms of expression are actively being suppressed, and as the arts and academia themselves are shifting with the influx of emergent technologies. This project embraces these challenges by creating opportunities for people to come together, explore connections between the past, present, and future, and reimagine what is possible.
Combining Mechanical and Digital Technologies to Engage Children with a Flying Pollinator Exhibit
Sara Lopus, Social Sciences
Elizabeth Minor, social Sciences
Sarah Harding, Mechanical Engineering
The Paso Robles Children’s Museum provides a hands-on, community-building environment for local kids to learn through interactive experiences that spark their curiosity. With grants from regional donors, the Museum is currently installing two new regional agrarian-themed exhibits: a fruit-harvesting orchard/vineyard and a “cycling the Central Coast” tricycle path. To complement those exhibits, a team of Cal Poly Mechanical Engineering (ME) senior project students will build a third, pollinator themed, exhibit that makes honeybee stuffed animals fly. Project design began in Spring 2025, with construction and installation complete by Winter 2026. A CET Seed Grant will enhance the ME students’ pollinator exhibit by covering material costs, plus the costs of advising an Anthropology and Geography (ANG) student who will strengthen the exhibit’s expressive technologies through addition of a digital component. Drawing upon faculty expertise in Digital Museum Projects, the expanded exhibit will offer children an immersive soundscape of bees and an Augmented Reality (AR)-generated bees-eye view of a flower in the palm of their hand. By combining physical play with digital storytelling, the exhibit will allow a diverse array of children to joyfully appreciate the wonder of pollinators.
Enhancing Student Mental Health Through Immersive Technologies, Nature and Psycho-Social Interventions
Keri Schwab, Experience Industry Management
Sandy Shen, Experience Industry Management
Lucy Bencharit, Psychology and Child Development
Mental health challenges are increasing among students, highlighting the need for simple, effective solutions that can be easily implemented. This project explores how short breaks in nature, or immersive, virtual 360 nature experiences, combined with positive activities like gratitude letter writing, can improve focus, mood, and overall well-being. Research shows that time in natural environments helps people mentally recharge, but access to nature isn’t always possible during students busy days on campus. This proposed study will test both real outdoor settings and immersive 360° videos of nature to determine if virtual experiences can offer similar restorative benefits. Three hundred students will participate in brief, 10-minute sessions involving either real or virtual nature exposure, followed by a reflective (letter writing) or personal choice task. Stress levels, attention, and emotional well-being will be measured before and after using the PANAS, Stroop test and Perceived Restorativeness Scale, as well as physiological sensors. The goal is to identify which combinations of environment and activity are most effective in helping students feel calmer, more focused, and have restored attention. This project is innovative and significant because it focuses on affordable, scalable strategies that schools and communities can adopt to better support student mental health. Potential outcomes include creating calming spaces on campus and /or offering virtual reality tools, or encouraging simple reflective practices. Findings will be shared with health providers, counseling centers, resident advisors, and mental health organizations. The project also aims to inform future initiatives that bring innovative, technology-based mental health solutions to a broader audience of students and young people.