It has come to our attention that there has been some public misrepresentation involving the Formula Hybrid Vehicle of the Watson School. Our grievances lie mainly in the false information regarding Michelle Digiacomo. For starters, she is not the president of the project. Her involvement is limited to the project’s fundraising and marketing efforts with Marca Peru which has contributed about half of the project’s money. She has had no say in the design or build of the vehicle, though she has reported to multiple publications that she is in charge of the entire project.

She is not responsible for any of the decision making regarding the design or construction of the vehicle. After being on hiatus for a few years, the project was restarted this past fall. Since then, the vehicle, which is the college’s largest ever senior project, has been being designed AND built from scratch primarily by 12 engineering students–including the project’s 3 team leads, all of whom are Watson seniors.

Furthermore, no one from the Society of Automotive and Aerospace Engineers (SAE) was present at the downtown dinner in late February. The BU chapter was chartered by Ryan Kelly (VP) and Montana Ortel (President) this semester. No communication was made between Michelle and the Executive Board of SAE prior to the previous articles being written. In the future, we’d like to involve members from any undergraduate pursuit in the organization. If you’d like any more information regarding SAE or the projects involved, you are more than welcome to contact us and come by.

Sincerely,

Binghamton University Society of Automotive and Aerospace Engineers

Mark Carbonaro

Mechanical Engineering, May ‘15

Ryan Kelly

Mechanical Engineering, May ‘15

Montana Ortel

Mechanical Engineering, May ‘15

Jay Francis

Mechanical Engineering, May ‘15