The goal of the International Research Experiences for Students (IRES): US-Mexico Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration for Smart Cities is to globally engage students in a research abroad experience to advance the knowledge on converting cities to Smart Cities.

This IRES program provided a research experience for thirty-three students (participants), three more students than the original goal, who were recruited to address Smart Cities challenges. Of those participants, 73% were undergraduate, and 27% were graduate students at the time of participation. All participants identified themselves as Hispanics, and 33% as female.

Participants worked with an interdisciplinary and international research team that included faculty from the home institution, The University of Texas at El Paso, and the Smart Cities Innovation Center that runs the Smart Cities Living Lab at the University of Guadalajara (host institution) located in Guadalajara, Mexico. Guadalajara was selected as the first core city of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Smart Cities initiative. IRES participants learned from the expertise of the hosting faculty who actively participate in Guadalajara's Smart Cities initiatives. Three cohorts of students engaged in the IRES program during the spring and summer semesters of 2018, 2019, and 2020. In 2020, the program was modified to a virtual research abroad experience for the third cohort in response to the COVID-19 pandemic maintaining previous years' content and quality of participant's experience.

The activities for each cohort of students included pre-departure training sessions in the spring semester at The University of Texas at El Paso followed by the research abroad experience at the University of Guadalajara. The IRES program included a research experience, professional development and cultural immersion activities for over a summer month at the University of Guadalajara. Professional development focused on advancing participants' intra- and inter-personal competencies to effectively collaborate with team members across disciplines, borders, and cultures. The first two cohorts of students attended professional events in Guadalajara to develop their communication and networking skills with a diverse group of stakeholders. All IRES participants collaborated in interdisciplinary and international teams. The IRES program offered cultural immersion activities to increase the ability of participants to develop culturally aware Smart Cities solutions with a global perspective.

IRES participants were immersed in activities to develop their research skills, expand their knowledge, and advance research on Smart Cities. These activities included hands-on workshops, seminars, talks, and technical meetings. Program participants addressed challenges common to the cities of El Paso and Guadalajara; participants presented innovative solutions to the IRES faculty (from both the home and host institutions) and technical and non-technical community members. The research areas of the IRES program included management of sensors and crowdsourcing data, data analytics and visualization, optimization, and simulation. Research outcomes include the integration of mobile devices with a wireless sensor network infrastructure to collect, integrate, and disseminate crowdsourced and sensor-generated data to support residents making travel decisions during a flooding event. This Smart Cities solution contributes to the area of Smart Mobility. A prototype Smart Flooding Alert System (Smart FAS), developed using mobile computing technology, was assessed using Smart Cities attributes, i.e., scalability, modularity, resilience, security, and interoperability with relevant Smart Cities services.

After involvement in the program, some of the participants have earned bachelor's and graduate degrees in Computer Science, Civil Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Systems Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering. Participants who have graduated currently hold jobs in IT and engineering companies and one government agency. The independent evaluation results indicate that participants have increased their knowledge of Smart Cities through participating in the IRES program. Participants also developed skills (intra- and inter-personal) to collaborate in teams across disciplines and borders.

The significance of this IRES program is centered on the growth of worldwide initiatives driven by industry, academia, and government to transform cities into Smart Cities and the need to train professionals with technical knowledge and, more importantly, inter- and intra-personal skills that enable them to effectively collaborate in teams with members across disciplines, cultures, and borders. This IRES program supported STEM students to further their knowledge about Smart Cities, develop research skills, and learn how to collaborate and communicate in interdisciplinary and international teams. The Smart Cities solutions created in this IRES program have the potential to improve the quality of life of residents in urban communities globally, with challenges similar to those identified in Guadalajara and El Paso. Research outcomes were disseminated through four published papers at the IEEE International Smart Cities Conference, the IEEE Smart Cities flagship conference, in 2019 and 2020. Through the successful completion of this program, the collaboration between The University of Texas at El Paso and the University of Guadalajara was strengthened.

Last Modified: 09/29/2021
Modified by: Natalia Villanueva Rosales