Scot Frank

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Over the history of humankind, distinct cultures have evolved in isolated enclaves of Earth’s geography. Now, as global markets expand, those cultures must choose between traditional and foreign technologies to meet their daily needs. Because communities know both the positives and the negatives of their own technologies, they often choose foreign technologies which they assume to be superior, primarily due to advertising. These technologies—invented thousands of miles away with a different set of design parameters in mind—are often ill-suited to local needs.

The ways in which this technology interface is changing cultures around the world crystallized for me during my time interning, teaching, and traveling in Asia.

Burma, June 7, 2006. Ballpoint pen barrels and loose springs adorn one street corner; nuts, portions of angle iron, and odd brackets another. Fragments of technology are sold at their face value. The application for which they were invented has either been disregarded or forgotten. Indeed, perhaps it was never known at all. Note to self: listening and teaching are just as important as the technology itself.

Ladakh, India, May 17, 2008. These roads, snaking between the snowy peaks of the Himalaya, Zanskar, and Korakoram ranges are impassable for nine months of the year. A truck lies broken by the riverbed. Across the river, a farmer sings to his yak, imploring him to pull harder as he drags the wooden plough across the fields. Note to self: self-efficacy and innovation are the children of self-confidence and awareness.

In Burma and Ladakh, I saw “sudden poverty.” People who had, until recently, produced all they needed, suddenly felt impoverished and inferior compared to the new world that they saw on television or advertised in nearby cities. After centuries of being their own masters in their own communities, they suddenly felt like insignificant pawns in a global system that didn’t care about their unique vision of local sustainable development. Technology was the most apparent symbol of how these communities were losing their right to determine their own futures. The glamour of foreign technologies lured people away from innovating in their own tradition, and the adoption of foreign technologies often yielded disappointing results.

I have a different vision for technology in communities newly integrated into the global economy—A vision whose mechanisms I wish to pursue. This is my dream: A world in which (1) communities self-confidently innovate (technologically or otherwise), (2) individuals feel empowered as inextricably connected threads of the living environment, and (3) global markets mean global friendships and idea exchange rather than global misrepresentations.

Over the past five years I have been working toward this dream through projects in the fields of educational technology, cultural preservation, water, and rural energy generation. In 2007, I responded to communities in Qinghai, China, who voiced a need for improved solar cookers by developing a solar device that provides portable cooking, household heating, and low-cost thermo-electricity. Constructed primarily from local knowledge and materials, this device later won two innovation awards: MIT IDEAS competition and Yunus Innovation Challenge.

Please read below for accounts of my current activities and past work.

Organizations / Companies

  • One Earth Designs (OED) - Leverages science, engineering, and business to design holistic and sustainable solutions to community voiced problems.

Projects

Articles

“We’re interested in language learning. We wouldn’t be doing this if it was just a way to save the stock market.” — Scot Frank

Publications

  • Scot Frank: From Digital Cultural Preservation to Water Safety in Western China. ICTD2009. April 17-19, 2009. Doha, Qatar.
  • Frank SG, Bernard PS: Profiling breast cancer using real-time quantitative PCR. In Rapid Cycle Real-Time PCR: Methods and Applications (Edited by: Wittwer CT, Meuer S, Nakagawara K). Heidelberg: Springer 2003, 95-106.

Awards

Talks

  • Workshop: Upcoming Wastewater Management in Rural Himalayan Communities. Sichuan, China. May 2009.
  • Presenter: Upcoming Rural Energy Generation and Innovations workshop for the Himalayas. Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation. Kathmandu, Nepal. June 2009.
  • Skills session speaker “Putting your commitment into action” at the Clinton Global Initiative U. 2009 Conference February 13 to 15 at University of Texas, Austin.
  • 11th Annual Colloquium on International Engineering Education - Invited talk - November 8, 2008.