1) a. We will use less background information, as the panel has now heard that information and doesn’t need to hear it again.
b. We will practice the presentation more. Our group only did 1 or 2 practice runs of the presentation, but it could have been a lot better if we had run through it more.
c. Add more back-up slides. A lot of questions that were asked during the presentation, we had answers to, but it would have been better if we had a slide to turn to.
d. Add more continuity. The feedback we received, was that the flow of the presentation needed work. I believe more transition slides would help the presentation flow
e. Add more visual appeal. Some of the feedback we received was that the slides were somewhat boring and hard to follow. In the future make the slides simpler and easier to understand.
f. Have everyone talk more during the presentation. The reviewers felt that I spoke too much, and didn’t allow the other members to contribute.
g. Have the presentation be more solution-based. A lot of our feedback told us that we didn’t cover our solution to the issue enough. In the future, cutting out background info will help with this.
h. Stop reading off slides. It was noticed that a lot of the information we talked about was already written, and thus didn’t need to be said again. We will take this into account next time.
i. Use more figures. A lot of the comments that were given to us involved not having justification for our work. This is something we can simply do by adding sources on the slides and mentioning where we got our information from.
j. Finally, using fewer filler words would help our presentation a lot. Our group had to say “um” and “like” frequently which takes away from our presentation as a whole.
2)Our work will not require IRB approval for the first trip to Sierra Leone, as we will just do some basic sensory testing, and will be focusing on survey mothers about what they do and don’t like. In no way will be testing a “product” or “solution” in Sierra Leone. Instead, we will be gathering data. From my understanding of IRB, we would have to be testing a product in hope for a result and conducting some sort of an experiment. In no way will we be conducting experiments for the first time we visit Makeni. In the next round of visiting Sierra Leone, we will need to get IRB approval. The second time the team visits Sierra Leone, the process will require IRB, as at that stage of the project, we will be testing our product on human beings. We would hope to have a full product at that time and can begin to test whether or not the product has a positive effect on malnutrition in the children. I personally won’t be involved with the project at that time, but we would submit our paperwork for approval as soon as our product is finished so we know what is being used and what is being tested for.
3) Our inputs will include, money, employees, expertise from people on the ground and at Lehigh, a bakery and materials to bake the muffins, food ingredients from local vendors and markets, partners to help fund the project, and time from our team and myself to work on the project. Some outputs we are striving for are, a final muffin product, new consumers, new jobs, new training for the workers, more income for street vendors, and a final paper to publish our results. The expected outcomes of the project are much greater. We hope to embellish a culture of healthy eating, and just hope to get people to begin eating more sweet potatoes. We also are looking to address malnutrition, so ultimately, we need to fix that issue. Our team is hoping that our product can reduce the high levels of malnutrition in the country. More than this, our product can save lives, and help the children that are growing into adults to develop more properly and hopefully can grow to make changes that impact their country as well. We hope to impact every life in Sierra Leone, and eventually we can bring our concept to other countries as well.