And you thought cell phones were only for what the kids call “texting”: six SIPA students, in partnership with UNICEF, have received the first-place award in the US Agency for International Development’s “Development 2.0 Challenge” for their project incorporating cell phones in monitoring child malnutrition. According to their project proposal, the students intend to replace the current paper-based system of monitoring children’s health with one using cell phones, allowing countries “to geographically map and track child malnutrition trends accurately and in real time. This tool will provide a critical means of intervention into rapidly unfolding food and nutrition crises.” The project will be tested in Malawi from this month through May.

Also, we don’t want to let any more time go by without congratulating Sam Daly, CC ’09, who last month recieved a prestigious Marshall Scholarship. Daly, whose “studies at Columbia have focused on African history and languages, specifically Swahili and Yoruba” will pursue a master’s degree at Oxford in the fall, joining Rhodes Scholar Jisung Park. Congrats to Sam!