Educate Ethical and Innovative Leaders for Africa

Now in its fifth year, Ashesi’s Engineering program continues to expand its ambitions for student learning and impact. Engineering students are able to tackle more ambitious projects thanks to our new fabrication lab, additional workshop tools and resources, and an added emphasis on research. And as faculty continue bringing industrial applications into the classroom, students are learning to solve key challenges affecting organizations across Africa. 

In this semester’s Introduction to Engineering class, first-year student teams built drones that can help mining companies retrieve samples from remote and inaccessible mining concessions. The 10-week project required students to not only build their drones from scratch but also included the design of claws for pickup and a GPS for autopiloting. The project, modeled after a challenge faced by a mine in Zimbabwe, aimed to help students develop foundational skills in Mechanical, Electrical, and Computer Engineering.

“Designing and programming drones allowed our students to explore aerodynamics, electronics, and programming,” says Mr. Tali, one of the class project supervisors. “This helps them build an understanding of how Ashesi’s three engineering majors work hand in hand in industry.

Watch the drone video here!

“It was frustrating at times,” says Clement ’23. “After spending hours on a specific part of the drone, we would find that it was not working the way it was supposed to. We had to keep troubleshooting, but thanks to support from  faculty, we were able to get the drones flying!”

Donors empower Ashesi engineering students to take on projects which they could only have imagined before arriving at Ashesi. We thank them for making this possible. 

Links:

• Watch the Drone Video Here!