On Monday evening, inside a rainbow-lit Kresge Auditorium, a capacity crowd whooped and hollered and shook their pom-poms along to one of the most anticipated shows of the year: the final student presentations of 2.009 (Product Engineering Processes).
Known on campus as “two-double-oh-nine,” the popular fall semester course challenges teams of undergraduates over three months to design, build, and draft a business plan for a product prototype, which they then demo and pitch in front of a live audience, on MIT’s largest stage.
This year, students worked in one of seven teams, each represented by a color of the rainbow. Teams were given $7,500, which they could put toward building, testing, and presenting their final prototype. This year’s design theme, “Move!” inspired a kaleidoscope of ideas, including a self-spooling firehose cleaner, a swim…
