Clinic Program Broadens Reach with Climate Clinics

The Clinic Program at Harvey Mudd College, a collaboration between education and industry for more than 50 years, features 45 projects for the 2023–2024 academic year. Sponsors range from a Hawaiian science museum to an international medical device manufacturer.

Harvey Mudd alumni and parents, key partners in facilitating Clinic connections, helped enable projects in computer science, engineering, mathematics and physics. Two of this year’s projects are Global Clinics, sponsored by alumni who work for Medtronic and the Technical University of Denmark Wind Energy.

In partnership with the Hixon Center for Climate and the Environment, the Clinic Program features two fully funded Climate Clinics. This funding supports the College’s commitment to climate science and also opened doors for conversations with other organizations, resulting in 10 projects that explore climate technology in the energy and automotive sectors as well as national labs.

A new endowment from Fletcher Jones Foundation supports one Climate Clinic project sponsored by Cowbell Labs, which is pursuing a scalable mechanism for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in the agriculture sector, both in the U.S. and abroad. Cowbell Labs is a spin-off of Spark Climate Solutions, a nonprofit co-founded by David Mann ‘01 that is committed to accelerating emerging climate solutions fields.

Another Climate Clinic, in partnership with the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), is focused on evaluating the equitable allocation of funding under recent federal infrastructure bills. The Clinic team will study how funding is being distributed and if this is in accordance with state and federal policies designed to ensure the funds go to communities disadvantaged, underserved or overburdened by pollution. The UCS project was privately funded by an HMC parent.

Through the Clinic Program, entrepreneurial endeavors are also being supported. Two students will develop and test novel ideas—one climate-related project, the other a biotechnology startup—with the goal of launching their companies after graduation.

Forty-six percent of current Harvey Mudd Clinic Program sponsors have previously sponsored projects.

2023–2024 Clinic Sponsors

• Amazon Lab126
• Applied Materials
• Apsis Solutions Ltd.*
• Argonne National Laboratory*
• ConcentricLife
• CrowdStrike
• Doosan Bobcat 
• DTU Wind and Energy Systems*, **
• Factor
• FedEx
• General Motors Company*
• Hawai’i Keiki Museum***
• Helion Energy Inc*
• HRL Laboratories, LLC
• Idaho National Laboratory*
• Inspiren
• Kaiser Aluminum Corporation
• Kansas State University/USDA
• Laserfiche
• Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory
• LS Power*
• Medtronic**
• MIT Lincoln Laboratory
• Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute
• Musizi University**, ***
• NASA Ames Research Center
• NorthStar Medical Radioisotopes
• Origin Materials*
• Periwinkle Trading
• Qualcomm
• Quantcast
• Sandia National Laboratories
• ServiceNow
• Shopify
• Cowbell Labs/Spark Climate Solutions*
• Systems & Technology Research
• Toyota*
• Tradeweb Markets
• Trilobio, Inc.
• Union of Concerned Scientists*, ***
• Wayfair
• Webflow

*Climate-related Clinic Project

**Global Clinic Project

***Social Justice Clinic Project