Meet the Team

Khanjan Mehta is the Founding Director of the Humanitarian Engineering and Social Entrepreneurship (HESE) Program and Assistant Professor of Engineering Design at Penn State. HESE is an integrated learning, research, and entrepreneurial engagement program focused on developing and commercializing technology-based solutions in low resource settings. In collaboration with his students, Mehta has published over 110 journal articles and refereed conference proceedings with ~50 more in the pipeline. Mehta serves as an Associate Editor for the IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, Contributing Editor for the Engineering 4 Change portal, and a reviewer for a wide array of journals and conferences. Find out more from his personal website here

Becca Ligrani is an Engaged Scholarship Coordinator for Penn State. In addition to creating PubHub, she co-developed and continually organizes the Penn State Engaged Scholarship Student Ambassador Program. Before joining the team at Penn State, Becca received her master’s degree from Virginia Tech in Agricultural, Leadership, and Community Education. She is particularly interested in the relationship between food, environment, social justice, and community development.

Sarah Ritter is an Assistant Professor of Engineering Design at Penn State University. She teaches both first-year engineering design and Biomedical Engineering senior design, as well as works with students in the Humanitarian Engineering and Social Entrepreneurship program. Sarah received her PhD in Biomedical Engineering from Texas A&M University, where her focus was on the development of minimally-invasive, long-term blood analyte optical monitoring systems, prior to joining the Penn State faculty.

Irena Gorski is an Engaged Scholarship Coordinator for Penn State. Irena’s work is focused on designing and testing lean and scalable models to expand opportunities for engaged scholarship for Penn State students. Irena was responsible for the initial setup of these modules and contributing feedback to them. Although Irena worked as an undergraduate researcher in three labs, she never contributed to a publication as an undergraduate student so she is excited that this resource can help a new generation of undergraduate researchers take their research contributions further. She will begin a Master’s program in public health this fall.

Sara Warnquist is an undergraduate at Penn State studying social psychology and social entrepreneurship in the developing world. She works on the Engaged Scholarship initiative curating scripts for and developing educational videos. Sara is also involved in undergraduate research herself in both social psych and international development, chairs several student organizations, and participates in local government. She hopes to encourage and inspire Penn State students to be more involved and aware on campus, locally, and internationally through her projects, including this site.