Hanley Sustainability Institute

By Mark Gokavi

University of Dayton lecturer Andrew Rettig wants his Internet of Things students to find solutions, but to do so they need problems to solve.

Starting about five years ago, Rettig has had Hanley Sustainability Institute student leaders present issues to Rettig’s IoT class.

“We’d have (clients) come into the classroom halfway through the class,” Rettig said, “and then they would introduce their Internet of Things issue, their problem, and then my students would work on writing up solutions to their problems using their experiences from the class.”

Sometimes, Rettig’s students just wrote plans. Other times, they designed actual devices in what Rettig calls his living lab.

“Since I’m closely tied with the sciences, I’m always looking for environmental monitoring,” Rettig said. “I’m very much environmentally conscious myself, so I’m thinking sustainability. And there’s no better way to prove sustainability than data-driven sustainability.”

Katie Schoenenberger, HSI’s director of student engagement, said the first partnership with Rettig’s class involved the Mission of Mary and temperature monitoring at Lincoln Hill Gardens.

The second project involved sensors under the cement pavers and green grid trays to monitor temperature and impact at Kennedy Union’s green roof.

“His class worked in groups to propose a system that could be installed on the patio with an easily accessible and intentionally visible display/control box,” Schoenenberger said. “This box (and system) would then not only serve to monitor the patio temperatures but also provide an on-campus lab site for future semesters of Andrew’s course. They would be able to access the control equipment and also visitors to the green roof would see the panel.”

Kevin McGrail, who is working on his Master’s degree in computer engineering, said: “Being a part of Dr. Rettig's class gave me real world experience and the ability to make a difference on campus.

“Working with HSI as a client was highly rewarding and it felt like the work I did mattered. It wasn't just a class looking at slides and getting tested, but doing hands-on development of technologies that help the environment. I can't name another class like it at UD.”

Other projects that reached the pilot implementation stage include the Curran Place solar array’s temperature monitoring, the Old River compost area’s temperature and soil moisture monitoring, the LoRaWAN gateway pilot for GPS vehicle location and building monitoring with Facilities Management for low-cost environmental monitoring with remote utility meter reading.

Recently, Rettig and three of his IoT students have started a company, Lil Data Monster LLC, to assist companies in the Dayton-Cincinnati area with IoT projects. They are also using the company to help carry over projects each semester and enable student innovation.

Rettig says the lines between Lil Data Monster and his classroom are blurred but that the company advocates open innovation all the time which helps to create a seamless partnership with the IoT classes. Rettig said students have access to the latest in IoT software and hardware development.

“It’s all kind of exciting and interesting,” he said. “It’s really my first time where I’m really trying to combine some of this development from the company and let the students kind of run with it a little bit and kind of see how this collaboration between the two works.”

A former student of Rettig’s, Anna Hecht, gave a conference presentation about the surprising effect of his class, one she only took because another course was cancelled.

“His students cared about the projects because, simply, the success of the project didn’t earn them a grade in the class,” she told an audience in Dallas. “And with this comes more freedom. We were given the freedom to take ownership of our projects and to find opportunities beyond the rubric.”

Rettig said UD administrators are aware of the connection between his company and course.

“They all kind of said, ‘Oh, this is great. This is good for the students, (so if) it’s good for the students, it’s good for the faculty, it’s good for the university,’ ” Rettig said. “And they’ve been very supportive of it. The fact that all of the stuff we work on is open source software and hardware, it probably helps (that) there’s no proprietary issues here.”

The pandemic interrupted Rettig's’s work on what he calls the Smart Campus Hub to integrate more systems and processes. With a background in geology and engineering, Rettig said more universities will teach IoT and use technologies to connect data, especially regarding sustainability.

“You’re going to see it more and more,” Rettig said. “We are in the era of big data. Internet of Things is the window into it.”

For more sustainability news and information, visit HSI’s news blog, the Hanley Sustainability Institute website and the sustainability program website. To sign up for HSI’s Sustainability Spotlight newsletter, register here.