- Sep 12, 2025
- by Galib Braschler + Marisa LaFalce
- Community Engagement, Social Impact + Justice, Sustainability + Society, Student Life, CHE in NYC
Bridging ambition and action students make an impact in NYC
Internships combine community-engaged learning and professional development
With nearly half of all internships unpaid, many college students face financial barriers and unequal access to professional opportunities. The CHE in NYC summer internship is fully funded, helping close that gap. It places Cornell Human Ecology students with community organizations like the Boys and Girls Club of Harlem.
Through these partnerships, students like Taylor Cole ’26 and Katrina Samuda ’26, gain meaningful work experience that benefits local
- Dec 1, 2023
- Social Impact + Justice, Alumni
The architect who shattered the glass ceiling in India
When she was 16, Ponni Mukundan Concessao, M.S. ’89 walked into one of India’s premier technical colleges and demanded a seat in the undergraduate architecture program. The Principal said they didn’t accept girls, citing security concerns. She quoted the Indian Constitution, which guarantees gender equality and went on to pursue legal action. “For me, it was that or an arranged marriage,” she recalled.
She became the first woman undergraduate at the National Institute of Technology’s
Armin Mostafavi
Armin Mostafavi is a postdoctoral researcher at Cornell University’s Design and Augmented Intelligence Lab (DAIL) in the Department of Human-Centered Design. His interdisciplinary research merges architecture, environmental psychology, and neuroscience, focusing on how built environments influence human behavior and cognition. Through innovative biofeedback and behavioral frameworks, Dr. Mostafavi aims to enhance architectural design by understanding and leveraging human responses.
Since 2019, he has worked on NIH-, NSF-, and NIDILRR-funded research projects led
Jan Jennings
Jan Jennings, a Professor in the Department of Design and Environmental Analysis, is a multi-disciplinarian by education, training and work experience in the fields of interior design, historic preservation and urban planning. From 1969 to 1973 she was one of three principal planners with the Tulsa Metropolitan Area Planning Commission who directed the preparation of the Comprehensive Plan update (Vision 2000) and designed and administered the citizen participation element of the Plan revision. She opened
John Elliott
I have three areas of expertise in teaching, involving three types of design literacies. These are visual literacy in design (DEA 1101), material literacy in design (DEA 2422) and ecological literacy in design (DEA 4220).
My research interests are related to the idea of "Nature inside" both in a theoretical and a practical sense. In the theoretical domain, I am interested in the aspects of material culture of the built environment that express a society's
Heeju Terry Park
Heeju Terry Park is a Professor in the Department of Human Centered Design at Cornell University. He obtained his Ph.D. at Oklahoma State University with an expertise in functional apparel and smart clothing. Dr. Park has participated in multiple funded multidisciplinary research projects aiming to improve the mobility and thermal comfort of personal protective clothing system including ballistic body armor and firefighters’ bunker gear. His professional career as an athletic apparel & footwear manager at
