This document describes the process of the MAKE committee to select interdisciplinary projects at EPFL. As a reminder, information about interdisciplinary projects can be found here: https://make.epfl.ch/interdisciplinary When a project is selected by the MAKE committee, it receives funding and access to resources (resources that are complementary to the resources existing in the laboratories) Two different committees are involved in the selection of MAKE interdisciplinary projects, with the following roles.

The operational committee:

• Following the projects throughout the year and providing support if necessary. The operational committee provides recommendations to the strategic committee.
• The operational committee can make recommendations to stop a project if safety issues are identified at anytime.
• The operational committee is composed of six members including representative of the VPT (durability), the AVP-SAO (student association) and the CCTC (transversal skills)

The strategic committee:

• Handling strategic questions, such as the long-term evolution of the project portfolio and repartition between sections
• The strategic committee is composed of members including representatives of the 5 representatives of the 5 faculties, a pedagogical expert and the AVP-education

The strategic and operational committee (see next chapters) take the following evaluation criteria in consideration to select projects:

Project related criteria’s

• (mandatory) A good supervision by an EPFL Professor and a coordinator (EPFL employee) in charge, as well as multiple partner laboratories
• The project feasibility: long term objectives are challenging but realistic and in line with EPFL pedagogical objectives and scientific disciplines. Interdisciplinary projects are aiming to lst at least 3 years.
• The prototype to build is challenging and requiring multiple backgrounds but it is still realistic with the existing EPFL resources and prototyping network
• The budget (including sponsors) is realistic for the objectives set
• Risks (financial, accident, EPFL image, etc.) shall be identified and mitigated properly

Pedagogical criteria’s

• Learning by doing: the project should reinforce theoretical learning seen in courses through practical implementation.
• Open ended: the project should offer the possibility for students to develop their creativity and to look for many different potential solutions
• Interdisciplinarity: favoring interdisciplinarity by allowing students from different backgrounds to contribute to the project. The prototype(s) to be produced must be complex enough to push students to make compromises between disciplines.
• Transversal skills: the project must allow transversal skills development (group/human management, project management, knowledge management etc..).
• Sustainability: The project must, as far as possible, lead students to consider the dimension of sustainability in their project. Ideally the students should develop a systemic approach in evaluating the impact of their developments or the solutions they propose.

A given project can be very strong regarding a given criteria and less developed in another. For instance, a given project could be strongly focusing on sustainability but not as interdisciplinary as other projects. None of these criteria are eliminatory (except the very first one) and this list aims at providing the project with a direction/goal, but it is not expected to excel in every criterion. Time management of students is also to consider as the workload on the side of classical courses is very high in MAKE projects.

The strategic and operational committees will evaluate the global picture of every project to make their decisions.

The submitted project shall have a three-year scope with yearly objectives. To be selected as a MAKE project, the project promoters need to:

• Submit a full written submission and make a presentation to the strategic committee. Based on this document and the hearing, the strategic committee with select projects and give them conditional support for a three-year period. The submission and presentation to the strategic committee will be requested only every three years. In between, the project will be followed by the operational committee.
• Supported projects will have to provide one activity report and a summary video to be evaluated by the operational committee at the end of every year three in total). The following information will be requested:
  • A written report
    • Project progress status and main achievements (comparing main objectives as presented at the beginning of the year with the year’s achievements.)
    • The three main objectives for upcoming academic year
    • Number of students involved and their sections.
    • List of laboratories involved in supervising the students, particularly in the form of credited projects (bachelor/semester/master).
    • Description of efforts made to limit the ecological footprint of the project and measures implemented to integrate a sustainability dimension.
  • A 3min video to summarize the project evolution and the information of the written report

Besides the activity report requested on a yearly basis, the operational committee will remain in contact with the project coordinator and members over the year to follow its evolution. Role and responsibilities of the different committees are described in the next chapter.

• The strategic committee meets every year early July
• The operational committee collaborates with projects over the year. Members from this committee stay in close contact with projects needing support or improvement in a specific area (see under for more information)

Responsibilities This committee has the following responsibilities:

• Following the projects’ developments over the year and ensuring they are feasible and properly supervised.
• Provide punctual supervision and support: meet with a MAKE project (the supervising team) to provide support when necessary. The operational committee will contact a project when they believe it could benefit from specific expertise(s) or if one or several aspects of the project need improvements.
  • Note: To avoid wasting time to already busy students, the operational committee will tailor each intervention to make it specific to a given project.

• Evaluating activity throughout the year (including yearly written activity report). The operational committee meets regularly to keep track of project activities. The operational committee provides recommendations to the strategic committee for renewing (or not) the funding of the projects in year two and three.
• Stopping a project in the event of a proven problem or safety issue for the students involved, the operational committee can any time recommend the stop of a project.

The operational committee will provide a summary of the supported project based on the yearly report and the contacts over the year to the strategic committee as recommendation for support renewal once a year.

Committee composition

• One representative the makerspaces SKIL and SPOT
• One representative of the VPA
• One student representative
• One representative of the CTCC for transversal competences
• One representative of the VPT with expertise in sustainability
• One representative of the AVP-SAO (student affairs)
• The MAKE coordinator

When contacted by the operational committee, the project managers are expected to answer and to collaborate to ensure good project development. The operational committee’s aim is to support the projects to maximize student learning and ensure their safety, they will ensure their intervention(s) are personalized and related to concrete aspects of the project.

Responsibilities This committee has the following responsibilities:

• Selecting new projects for a three-year period.
  • The project funding is conditional and must be validated every year, based on the operational committee report. (The three-year scope allows to give the students and Professors a longer-term scope needed to settle such ambitious projects and the yearly review allows to take action if the project is not matching expectations.)
• Stopping a project if the quality declines and does not match EPFL standards (in terms of supervision and/or feasibility) – based on recommendations provided by the operational committee
• Taking strategic decisions, and equilibrating the project portfolio to match EPFL objectives and project representativity to ensure among other equity for the sections and project portfolio to cover strategic topics.

Committee composition

• One member from each faculty (x5)
• One pedagogical expert
• AVP-education