From left to right: ETA-Florence Renewable Energies company founder Angela Grassi and Bioenergy Division Director Maurizio Chocci meet with students Cheryl Szafran and Binta Barry from the energy consulting team.
Note to readers: This is the second installment of a series of blog posts
Day 2
Four students within the College advised ETA-Florence Renewable Energies on ways to deepen partnerships with U.S. scientists. Students Michael Proverdi, Rhonda Woods, Cheryl Szafran and Binta Barry met with ETA company founder Angela Grassi and senior staff to discuss strategy. The company expects the student consultants to critique their social media outreach, identify potential U.S. partners, and find academic contributors to the journal Biomass & Bioenergy. Grassi noted the company’s recent success in attracting Philip Morris International senior executives to a recent conference and hoped that students would identify more partners from the U.S. private sector as well.
The students are part of the College’s International Field Study Experience taught by Dr. Marissa Lombardi — the only online course within the College with a built-in study abroad component. This year’s theme of sustainability brings four teams to Italy, where the students follow-up on consultancy projects begun in their online studies. The students come from several different master’s degree programs at the College, combining their areas of expertise.
Next up: The education student team discusses international program assessment with an Italian international exchange program.