Northwestern Engineering Graduate Students Earn Third Place at MIT EnergyHack 2022

Northwestern Engineering students Archana Ramasubramaniam and Rupa Bhagwat earned third place in the MIT EnergyHack 2022 competition held November 11-13.

The hackathon focused on strategies to decarbonize the built environment. Several hundred hackers gathered from around the world to compete in the hybrid-format event.

Archana, a graduate student working toward a master’s degree in computer science and a minor in engineering management — offered through the Master of Engineering Management (MEM) program within the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management Sciences — and Rupa, a MEM student at the McCormick School of Engineering, joined MIT undergraduate students Emma Shi, Claudius Tewari, and Eric Zhou as team “My Head Hertz.”

My Head Hertz was matched with Tynt Technologies Inc., a new manufacturer of dynamic smart windows based in Boulder, Colorado. The team developed a communication strategy to market Tynt’s product to consumers, which included a proposed app enabling customers to view real-time stats on energy savings and carbon dioxide emission reduction as well as calculate the payback period on the investment.

EnergyHack was the first hackathon-style event in which Archana participated. She was excited to experience the process of developing solutions and decision-making within time constraints.

“My goal for the event was to focus on networking, meeting new companies, and getting the most out of the hackathon,” Archana said. “I was competitive, but I knew the chances of us getting a position was low. It was the experience that I was counting on.”

Archana and Rupa were among 11 MEM students that traveled to Boston to participate in the hackathon.

Mark Werwath, executive director of Northwestern Engineering’s Office of Professional Education, director of the MEM program, and codirector of the Farley Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, provided guidance to the Northwestern teams and emphasized the importance of the team presentations.

“He suggested that the presentation is the key to the competition” Archana said. “We realized that all of the work we put into our solutions doesn’t matter unless we can present our ideas effectively, so we spent a lot of time on our presentations.”

During the semifinal round, the team presented virtually to Tynt CEO and cofounder Ameen Saafir. Among all the teams that worked on Tynt’s challenge statement, Saafir selected My Head Hertz to advance to the finals, which entailed a second proposal presentation shared with fellow hackers and competition judges.

Archana valued the experience of working with team members from different backgrounds.

“We wanted to make sure that everyone could make a significant contribution,” Archana said. “What impressed me the most was how it all came together, how we all shared ideas and ultimately coalesced with one proper solution that blends and flows across each of our backgrounds.”

Archana and Rupa are both members of the McCormick Graduate Leadership Council (MGLC) as operation chair and social chair, respectively. MGLC serves as a liaison between graduate students and administrative leadership and aims to build community among the graduate students across the nine Northwestern Engineering departments.

Archana is also the communications chair for the Graduate Women Across Northwestern (GWAN), a student organization which aims to create community-building opportunities for women in the graduate and professional programs at Northwestern.



Archana is building on prior experience with HTML, Java, and JavaScript with coursework in full stack web development, data analytics, and front-end web development. She plans to graduate in December. Inspired by technology for social impact, she aims to pursue a career in the healthcare technology sector as a full-stack, front-end, or back-end developer. 


“I want to be able to give back to the community and help in some way,” Archana said. “I can follow the technology in healthcare path to bring both my passions to light.”


She completed an internship this summer at Dexcom, Inc., a company that develops continuous glucose monitoring systems for diabetes monitoring.

Following the completion of her bachelor of engineering in computer science degree program from Sathyabama University in Chennai, India, she worked with clients Philips Healthcare and Hewlett Packard Enterprise as a software engineer at Wipro Limited.


“My ultimate aim had always been to complete my master’s degree here in America, because I wanted to be exposed to the latest technology and see how things work here,” Archana said. “I have to say it has definitely paid off.” 


Long-term, Archana hopes to apply her management training to entrepreneurship within the healthcare technology industry.