Rebeca Hwang

Rebeca Hwang was born in Seoul, Korea, raised in Argentina and received her education in the USA. Because of her multicultural upbringing, she has developed a wide range of interests and skills. Formally trained as a chemical, civil and environmental engineer at MIT, Cambridge, she discovered that her real passion was to find solutions to pressing problems in the world, particularly those related to improving access to safe water by poor communities in developing countries. During her undergraduate years, she participated in a number of initiatives and competitions that promoted sustainable solutions to developmental problems, one of which generated US patents 6 929 236, 6 935190 and 6 929235. The IP was donated to an NGO, Design that Matters, which took the technology to New Zealand, where a local businessman manufactured a 15 cent clamp that makes cholera treatment much more accessible to the millions of patients ever year [Read more]. Her teams were honored to win the 1K award at the 50K MIT business competition with a proposal to generate chlorine locally in Haiti, and the IDEAS competition by designing a project to improve ceramic filer technology in Nicaragua. She also received a grant from the Lemelson Foundation.

Rebeca has always been keen in science: she was a gold medal for the National Chemistry Olympiad, a bronze medal for the National Physics Olympiad, and the first prize a national cancer research contest in Argentina. Rebeca was ranked first out of 2500 students five years in a row at the Colegio National de Buenos Aires secondary school. She has demonstrated leadership skills by serving as the president of the Club Argentino at MIT for several semesters, and by representing the second generation Korean students at the Korean Science and Engineering Association. She was also involved in Thinkcycle and Design that Matters, both initiatives that attempted to match real local needs with sustainable solutions.

Rebeca has significant fieldwork experience in Latin America and India. She is currently pursuing her PhD degree in the Interdisciplinary Graduate Program in Environment and Resources at Stanford University. Her thesis topic is based on the role of social network structures on the performance of water cooperatives in Argentina. Her research was recently featured in CNET. Rebeca is seeking to integrate institutional approaches and entrepreneurial principles to increase the efficiency and improve distributional effect of water management in Latin America. Rebeca currently leads the BASES Social e-challenge competition and is the Judging Chair for the California Clean Tech Open Competition. Avid runner, rugby player, enthusiastic dancer and passionate reader, Rebeca enjoys traveling and practicing her Spanish, Italian, French and Korean language skills.