Photo Spotlights

State officials including Lt. Gov. Kathy Hochul and Assemblyman Harry Bronson, standing next to Hochul, helped RIT President Bill Destler and Ryne Raffaelle, RIT vice president for research and associate provost, cut the ribbon on RIT’s Battery Prototyping Center. RIT offered tours and hosted nearly 50 industry executives for a workshop on how they can use the new center, a $1.5 million state-of-the-art facility that will conduct research and work with companies in this rapidly growing local industry.

The defending champion RIT women’s hockey team will travel to Mercyhurst University for the College Hockey America Championship weekend. On Friday, sixth-seeded RIT will face top-seeded Mercyhurst in the first semifinal at 3 p.m. This is the last championship run for seven seniors who made history by winning RIT’s first NCAA title in any women’s sport as freshmen in 2012. Last season, the group led RIT to its first College Hockey America Championship in just its second season as a Division I program. Clockwise from bottom are Marissa Maugeri, Ali Binnington, Kolbee McCrea, Emilee Bulleid, Morgan Scoyne, Lindsay Grigg and Celeste Brown.

RIT student and Datto employee Greyson Watkins, left, talks with new media interactive development student Shawn Ribaudo at the 2015 Spring Career Fair. The fair is set for 10 a.m.-4 p.m. today in the Gordon Field House. More than 750 recruiters representing 250 companies are registered to meet with an expected 4,000 students and alumni seeking co-op and full-time positions. Every region of the U.S. will be represented at the fair, with around half of the employers attending the fair based outside of New York. Datto, based in Connecticut and founded by Austin McChord '07 (bioinformatics), recently opened offices in downtown Rochester.

Coffee really is “good to the last drop.” RIT environmental science student Rebecca Clontz is turning coffee grinds into biofuel and an organic fertilizer for her graduate thesis research. Clontz and biology professor Jeff Lodge won a $15,000 Dean’s Research Initiation Grant from the College of Science to fund the project.

The RIT Gospel Ensemble performed during Gospel Fest in Panara Theatre on Feb. 27. The featured guest was evangelist and singer Jekalyn Carr. The program is sponsored by RIT’s Office for Diversity and Inclusion, the Center for Campus Life, Student Government and the RIT Gospel Ensemble.

Students celebrated the Chinese New Year with papercutting demonstrations, music and food on Feb. 26. From left, students Felisa Sze, James Franclemont, Matthew Tsang and Sarathi Hansen created their own paper designs. Papercutting is popular with many different cultures around the world, particularly during special events. Sponsors were the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures and the Division of Student Affairs.

Ray Ptucha, assistant professor of computer engineering in the Kate Gleason College of Engineering and an RIT alumnus, demonstrates his autonomous wheelchair driven by a skeleton at the seventh annual Graduate Education Week and Symposium on Feb. 27. Ptucha performs research on autonomous systems and human-computer interaction. The event’s keynote speaker, Ptucha specializes in machine learning, computer vision, robotics and embedded control.

Claire Benson, a third-year advertising and public relations major, tests out the newly launched College of Liberal Arts Navigator, a digital advising tool, at the Major, Minor and Immersion Fair on Feb. 26. The computer program was created to connect students from all disciplines with minors and immersions that meet their interests.

Walid Yaqoobi from Kabul, Afghanistan, left, and David Narvaez from Panama co-founded RIT’s newest club on campus: the RIT Fulbright Scholars Association. The club boasts 33 international students from around the globe who have “become like a family,” said Yaqoobi. To read more, go to rit.edu/news/athenaeum_story.php?id=51207.

RIT Bhangra entertained the audience with dance during Global Union’s Unification on Saturday. A main event for FreezeFest weekend, Unification features many international student clubs performing music, dance and skits. Global Union is a student organization that represents international students and cultural organizations at RIT.

Students lined up to test offerings from local food trucks. The event was part of FreezeFest, a student festival celebrating winter in Rochester.

Students from Phi Kappa Psi competed in a winter obstacle course on Feb. 21 during FreezeFest weekend. The Winter Warrior event tested participants’ strength, conditioning and teamwork and was sponsored by Phi Kappa Psi and Sigma Chi. Other highlights from the sixth annual winter festival included comedian Bo Burnham, Olympic curling, ice carving, frozen food trucks and a 5K run/walk.