Nikil Ragav’s inventXYZ program is dedicated to bringing high-tech, hands-on education to students everywhere by setting up makerspaces, or collaborative work spaces, at partner schools across the country.
His proposal to address that need was selected for the 2020 President’s Innovation Prize, which includes an award of $100,000, and an additional $50,000 living stipend.
Ragav, from Sugar Land, Texas, graduated from Penn last year from the Jerome Fisher Program in Management and Technology (M&T) studying electrical engineering in the School of Engineering and Applied Science and operations, information, and decisions at the Wharton School.
“Nearly every job, regardless of industry, from manufacturing to medicine,” says Ragav, “is fundamentally changing due to advances in robotics, AI, automated manufacturing, internet connected electronics, and data…