SMART: Student Multidisciplinary Applied Research Teams

Service learning and research with a difference. The SMART choice.

The Student Multidisciplinary Applied Research Teams (SMART) Program brings together teams of students and faculty from diverse disciplines and pairs them with social enterprises, organizations, or community groups located in developing countries. Teams work on well-defined assignments that challenge students to apply the knowledge and skills learned in the classroom in real world settings. The objectives of the program are to:

Provide students with an innovative service-learning experience working with under-served businesses, NGOs, universities, and rural communities in developing countries.
Improve students’ analytical abilities to develop case studies and other academic analyses of emerging markets issues.
Improve students' abilities to work in a multidisciplinary teams and multi-cultural environments.
Provide technical assistance and analytical support to under-served social enterprises, NGOs, and communities.

CU students working with M'hudi Winery in South Africa — SMART students working with Mhudi Winery. The first black-owned winery in South Africa.

What former students have said about SMART:

“It was amazing. It's the best thing I've done so far at Cornell and I learned more in those two weeks than I did the entire last semester.”
“Perfect experience. I would include SMART in 100 things to do before graduation.”
“The SMART program places you in the perfect position to contribute your expertise to a problem that will have an impact on the lives of others. In my opinion, the SMART program is an experiential, education model that all universities should look to.”

SMART students working on a calamansi exporting business in the Philippines

What our partners say about SMART:

“It is rare that a small company like ours gets a multi-skilled team of highly talented individuals looking into it, dissecting it, and coming out with tailor- made recommendations that we can now use to re-engineer and re-innovate our business system.” – Gichanga Karanja, CEO, Freshco, Kenya
"The Cornell team has done for my company in 10 days what would otherwise take months and thousands of dollars to do through local service providers.” – Rajinder Mand, Managing Director, Zanobia Seeds, Tanzania
"My engagement with SMART has taken my company to the next level.... Getting such services from local consultants would have cost me the shirt on my back.” – Frank Taylor, Managing Director, Wild-Foods, Botswana
“We were so excited about the work the SMART team did with us we invited one of the members back to work with us for 3 months....We would love to have another SMART team work with us. The team not only developed several recipes for ice cream and cottage cheese that we're already using, they also gave us great advice and instruction on improving our food safety practices.” – Andy Brown, Owner, Brown’s Cheese, Kenya R

This project is now in update mode. Check back regularly to see how things are progressing.