Georgia Tech hosted a successful 5th Annual Healthy Environments & Active Lifestyles (HEAL) Open House on Tuesday, April 23. The open house showcased demonstrations of student projects and research from several Georgia Tech organizations, including: The Aware Home Research Initiative (AHRI), Design and Technology for Healthy Aging, The Center for Assistive Technology and Environmental Access (CATEA), the Wireless Rehabilitation Engineering Research Center (Wireless RERC) and others.
This year, the program included speakers organized by the Wireless RERC to kickoff the evening and set the stage. After a welcome address given by Dr. Archie Ervin, Vice President of Institute Diversity, the keynote address was given by Lee Mabie, director of Emerging Consumer Markets at AT&T. His comments focused on how the AT&T value, "Deliver the Future First," drives his team toward developing innovative product, service and customer experience solutions for people with disabilities, the aging population and their respective caregivers. Mabie also described how The Connected Child, a child-centered educational concept born out of AT&T’s Advisory Panel on Access and Aging (AAPAA), inspired him to innovate a new educational approach for his special needs daughter London and how that experience has fed back into his work at AT&T. Attendees then moved to the exhibits at the Wireless RERC, Aware Home and CATEA locations.
HEAL brought together projects from the participating organizations that revolved around a common theme: Showcase the great work being done at Georgia Tech related to independence through better design of environments and application of design and technology to improve the lives of people of all abilities. Several Virginia Tech projects were also presented via videos and further emphasized the importance of universal design in creating products appropriate for specific needs with mass appeal. Georgia Tech students and faculty were on hand to share their projects and research and to hear constructive feedback. Visitors did a great job providing that feedback and many students confirmed it was an exceptional experience. Visitor feedback from the event was very positive with some VIPs leaving “inspired” by the number of projects and mentioning a couple that stood out as strong contributions to the field of disability access. Thanks to all who helped with and participated in the event and to our visitors for making it a success.
