Volunteerism is a mainstay at NJIT, with students and faculty engaged in a range of initiatives to better the community. Such efforts, amounting to more than 59,000 hours of community service over the past year alone, have been recognized both nationally and locally.   The university has made the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll, “one of the highest recognitions a university can receive for its commitment to volunteering, service-learning and civic engagement,” six times. And just recently, NJIT received another nod with a Commerce and Industry Association of New…

Not long after his arrival to the New York Giants in 2005, Justin Tuck and his wife, Lauran, founded Tuck’s R.U.S.H. for Literacy to bring greater educational and career opportunities to youth in the New York City metro-area. Nearly a decade on, the two continue to share their passion for education — appearing at NJIT for the Junior Achievement Career Success® Workshop College Series to meet with Newark-area high school students and speak with them about the importance of college and career.  Afterward, Justin and Lauran further discussed the inspiration for…

An interdisciplinary engineering team developing an enzyme-blocking drug designed to reduce levels of LDL, or “bad cholesterol,” was the winner of this year’s TechQuest challenge, announced this week at NJIT’s sixth annual Innovation Day. Senior Victoria Harbour, a chemical engineering major, and junior Patricia Iglesias-Montoro, a biomedical engineering student, (below) are synthesizing and testing a small molecule, hydrogel therapy to prevent PCSK9, an enzyme circulating in the bloodstream, from interfering with the body’s mechanisms for metabolizing cholesterol. The pair notes that people…

Innovation Day is a showcase of cutting-edge, student-led research that includes inventions that improve lives, novel business ideas, computer games and fundamental scientific research. This year, nearly three dozen student projects – from mapping applications for the transportation industry, to human control interfaces for surrogate robots, to novel drugs that target cholesterol – will be on display in the Campus Center on April 10. A growing number of these undergraduate researchers are taking their innovations on the road: to technology conferences, along commercialization pathways such…

Since 2017, NJIT students, faculty and administrators have gathered for “Talking Back to Hate,” a teach-in about ways to understand and overcome evolving challenges in the expanding digital media landscape, such as misinformation, cyberbullying, trolling and more. “Fake news is false information that works to divide us into ‘them’ and ‘us,’ and makes us believe that every unhappiness and injustice in our lives is the fault of ‘other’ groups of people,” said the event’s faculty co-sponsor, Nancy Steffen-Fluhr, director of the Murray Center for Women in Technology at NJIT. “Hate and…

In March, NJIT staged the first-ever “CLEAR: Cradle to Career” (C3 2018) Summit, aimed at “fostering a larger networked community of innovative and dedicated teachers, leaders, faculty researchers and students of all ages”. The summit — co-hosted by NJIT’s statewide K-20 Collaborative for Leadership, Education, and Assessment Research (CLEAR) — brought together an expansive audience of NJIT students, faculty and staff; K-12 educators and leaders; and public and private organizations throughout the state.   The event featured a day of presentations and networking events to help…

On April 3, Newark-area high school students and teachers arrived at NJIT in anticipation of meeting two-time Super Bowl champion and New York Giants Hall of Fame inductee, Justin Tuck. Justin and Lauran Tuck, co-founders of the nonprofit Tuck’s R.U.S.H. for Literacy, appeared as special guest speakers at this year’s 2018 Junior Achievement (JA) Career Success® Workshop College Series to help promote career development among New Jersey’s high school learners. “There are probably more people here today in this room than where I grew up in my hometown of Kellyton, Alabama,” said Justin…

The first Friday afternoon of Spring 2018 brings an exciting concert to campus — acclaimed pianist Sophia Agranovich will be joined by two of her exceptional students, Mohammed Boubendir and Robert Argasinski. David Dubal, internationally known pianist, author, broadcaster and painter will introduce musical selections from composers such as Beethoven, Chopin and Liszt. The event is the first in the 2018-2019 Rauch Family Foundation Charitable Trust Concert Series at NJIT. Agranovich has performed with prominent musicians and orchestras internationally. Her widely broadcast recordings and…

Neuroecology of Unusual Animals Laboratory How do nervous systems evolve and adapt to extreme environments? The Soares lab uses neuroethological and ecological methods to understand the evolution of neural adaptation, examining the evolution of circuitries, behavioral adaptation and sensory novelty. This integrative approach links a detailed characterization of the environment with the anatomy and function of neural systems within a phylogenetic context. Soares and her students study the blind cavefish Astyanax mexicanus, found in central Mexico, which is born with eyes and lenses that…

NJIT alumni continue to prove that when armed with a degree from one of the nation’s leading public high-tech universities, trails are blazed and professional dreams really do come true. Just ask alumna Ivana Seric ’17, who was able to turn her love of sports, math and science into a dream job with the NBA. “I’ve played basketball since I was 7-years-old,” said Seric, who was born in Split, Croatia. At 12 years old, she became captivated by the fanfare and excitement of collegiate sports while watching her first American college basketball game. “I was fascinated by how many people came…