Waterstrider is a collaboration between myself, a team of engineering students, and RIT’s dean of engineering. The goal of the project is to enable handicapped children to experience greater freedoms when swimming. Design requirements include: the ability to swim without constant physical supervision, aesthetics that do not draw comparisons to typical handicapped devices, ease of access, and portability.

The early development stages of the Waterstrider project sought to visualize the elements of engineering that had already gotten underway. Once the team understood what human factors features had to be implemented with their calculations, an overall design solution started to emerge.

The program is unique because it features student designers and engineers working together to develop products in a real world development cycle. Such collaborations between disciplines are relatively new and are being pushed forward by students and professors who are eager to create more fully realized designs.

Waterstrider is currently under development to proceed to manufacturing.