Christopher Herlich (M.U.P) and Mark Langrehr (M.Arch) are two of nineteen U-M students representing six teams who will travel to India in May as part of the Global Information Engagement Program (GIEP) scholars.

Mark Langrehr (pictured back row, left) and Christopher Herlich (pictured back row, center). Photo courtesy School of Information.

Herlich's team includes U-M School of Information (UMSI) students Michael Wayne Harris and Marlon Phillips and the trio will work with the Indian Institute for Human Settlements in Bangalore on a project titled, "Visualizing India's Cities." The project will examine large data sets (such as Indian census data), extract subsets of that data relevant to Indian cities, and maintain them into a repository.

Langrehr will work on a project titled, "The Hampi Arts Initiative," with UMSI students Michelle Fiesta and Aysha Siddique and the team will survey, document and archive arts and crafts of the Hampi region with the goal of educating the community about Hampi’s rich cultural heritage. The students will collaborate with Jaaga Trust, a community of entrepreneurs, activists, designers, and artists in Bangalore.

The Global Information Engagement Program is an innovative approach to learning that partners nonprofit, research, and educational organizations to use information and technology skills to deal with a contemporary social concern. The students involved in this years’ projects spent the past semester studying a specific information problem and creating a framework to address it and the students will implement and further develop their plans while spending six to 12 weeks working with partner organizations in India.