Signature Polytechnic Experience (PolyX)

Signature Polytechnic Experiences (PolyX)

Signature polytechnic experiences (PolyX) at Cal Poly Pomona promote students’ discovery of the opportunities and challenges within the field and the development of creative and innovative solutions to those conditions. Through collaborative learning and intense mentoring, PolyX engages students beyond the classroom and prepares them for professional and civic success.

PolyX FYE Showcase

First-year students participate in a Signature Polytechnic Experience (PolyX) within their FYE courses and present their work at the PolyX Showcase each fall semester. This early immersion in Cal Poly Pomona's learn-by-doing approach and polytechnic advantage prepares students for success from their first semester. From multidisciplinary research to community-based projects, students demonstrate how they apply classroom knowledge to real-world challenges. These showcases celebrate student achievement, collaboration, and innovation— and acts as an invitation to explore the future being built by Cal Poly Pomona’s emerging leaders!

 

PolyX offers you a one-of-a-kind educational experience through experiential learning, multi-disciplinary perspectives, collaboration and professional readiness.

For Students

Learn about PolyX for Students

For Faculty & Staff

Learn about PolyX for Faculty & Staff

Upcoming

Fall PolyX Showcase
Tuesday December 2nd, 2025

The Fall PolyX Showcase highlights the innovative work of Cal Poly Pomona students as they present research and creative projects developed in PolyX courses. Join us at the Ursa Major in the Bronco Student Center (BSC) from 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. to celebrate the impact of experiential education and the dedication of our students and faculty mentors!

*Please keep an eye out for updates from the Innovation Incubator Team regarding registration details.

About Fall PolyX Showcase

Past

FYE PolyX Showcase
Tuesday April 29, 2025

Join us at the UHS Suites Multipurpose Room from 11:45 a.m. to 1 p.m. as first-year students present their PolyX projects! This event showcases the power of Cal Poly Pomona’s hands-on learning, giving students an early start on real-world experiences.

PolyX Writing Workshop
Tuesday March 20th, 2025

Are you working on a Signature Polytechnic Experience (PolyX) application? Join our writing workshop to get support from the Innovation Incubator team!

EDU 5180: Preparing Future Teachers

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Cynthia Geary

College of Education and Integrative Studies

E-mail: ckgeary@cpp.edu

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Dr. Cynthia Geary’s EDU 5180: Preparing Future Teachers course offers a rich, four-layered mentorship model to prepare teacher candidates for success in the CalTPA and K–12 classrooms. Candidates receive support from professors, peer learning communities (PLCs), cooperating teachers, and university supervisors. This hands-on, collaborative approach builds professional skills, fosters reflective practice, and equips future teachers to lead with confidence in today’s schools.

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PLT 4210: Production Mycology

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Eshwar Ravishankar

College of Science

E-mail: eravishankar@cpp.edu

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Dr. Eshwar’s PLT 4210: Production Mycology course immerses students in the science and practice of mushroom cultivation. Through hands-on modules in fungal ID, climate control, fruiting optimization, and bioremediation, students gain real-world experience in sustainable mycology. The course also explores entrepreneurship in the mushroom industry, culminating in research poster presentations submitted to the RSCA conference at Cal Poly Pomona.

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Legal Empowerment and Advocacy Program (LEAP)

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Areli Castro

Support and Equity Program

E-mail: ascastro@cpp.edu

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Areli Castro's Legal Empowerment and Advocacy Program (LEAP) includes sessions on immigration policy, advocacy skills, and how to access and effectively utilize legal resources. Peer advocates enrolled in this program will also organize community events and workshops to raise awareness and provide support.

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BillyBOT: Bronco Robotic Campus Tour Guide

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Farbod Khoshnoud

College of Engineering

E-mail: fkhoshnoud@cpp.edu

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Dr. Farbod Khoshnoud's BillyBOT project at Cal Poly Pomona immerses students in the end-to-end development of an entirely new robotic system. Through hands-on work in robot design, AI-driven navigation, human-robot interaction, and user experience, students create original innovations across multiple disciplines. The course fosters collaboration in engineering, marketing, and research, with opportunities to publish, develop open-source tools, and explore patentable solutions. BillyBOT exemplifies PolyX learning by turning creativity and discovery into real-world robotic systems that are scalable, adaptive, and impactful.

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The Learn Through Discovery Projects Hatchery (Hatchery) provides students support and resources to explore ideas that they are passionate about and turn them into projects that have real impact on communities. With projects ranging from applied research, start-up's, to community events, students from all disciplines engage in three phases that first allow them to explore their topic (through identifying and understanding the problem to be solved), further develop their idea (by preparing a proposal and budget), and finally, implementing and assessing the project (the Hatchery provides up to $8,000 in funding at this phase). Students receive peer, staff, and faculty mentoring during the process and cross-collaborate with other students and faculty within the Hatchery.

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EWS 4430 - Women, Health, and Body Politics Zine Making is designed to educate and empower students to become active knowledge producers by contributing to two zine libraries on the Cal Poly Pomona campus. Located at the Pride Center and the Womxn’s Resource Center, these two cultural centers serve as ideal locations to share what students learn with the larger campus community. Zines are pieces of original art-activism. They are handmade magazines that generate visual and textual arguments that contribute to activist and social justice movements. By synthesizing their knowledge and applying it in inventive and purposeful ways, students in this course will demonstrate the knowledge they have gained about intersectional body politics and intersectional identities. Most impactfully, this course prepares students to became curious and imaginative change-makers.

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ANT 3500HS Environment, Technology and Culture (Honors, Service-Learning) is a general education class (D4 or B5) that takes an applied anthropological approach to confronting the climate crisis and achieving sustainability goals. This course engages students in community-based action research projects in partnership with service-learning partners, including CHERP Locally Grown Power (LGP). Students have a unique opportunity to take part in a just transition to renewable energy by supporting CHERP LGP’s mission to establish the world’s first ever, non-profit solar panel assembly factory in Pomona, which will provide discounted electricity to low-income residents. Divided into teams based on particular interests and skills, students undertake group projects through intense mentorship with Dr. Blair, as well as dedicated staff at CHERP LGP. Projects may include, but are not limited to: community solar access and outreach; volunteer program design; workforce development; regenerative economic modeling; climate action policy implementation; environmental scan research; and GIS mapping. Students typically present their findings to CHERP LGP’s Board of Advisors and the broader community.

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The course teaches students how to carry out ethnographic research from the development of a research question to a final conference presentation and ethnographic research article. Projects are health related and carried out in partnership with the Center for Health Disparities Research at UC Riverside’s School of Medicine. Students will gain an understanding of the social and structural mechanisms for how inequality “gets under the skin” while also gaining skills in participant observation, in-depth interviewing, life histories, material culture analysis, and qualitative data analysis using NVivo. Students are research assistants on the project and work collaboratively with undergraduate and graduate students at UC Riverside. The experience positions students for employment in the fields of social science research, public health, non-profit sectors and/or applying to graduate programs in anthropology, health sciences, and related professions. Past students have received intense mentorship, disseminated their research beyond the classroom, and work collaboratively on a multidisciplinary research team.

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