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1018spotlightnj2_2025-10-18-09-19-29

STEM is something I find extremely fascinating and especially when you have female engineers. Alina Zara is president of the Rutgers solar car. We were talking about the car you built and your first competition. How did that go? So our first competition was actually a great experience for all of us. So how competition works is that the 1st 3 days you'll. Get your car scrutineered and it's this really intense process where they make sure that you pass all of these stations that they've set up to make sure that your car is safe because these cars do um end up sometimes blowing up or are causing crashes um so they have to make sure that your car is completely safe before they let you race um there will be around 40 to 60 teams from all across North America that will end. For this competition, but after scrutineering only about 10 to 15 of them, um, make it onto the track and actually get to race. So as a first time team we weren't really in the hopes of making it to the track, but when we got there we realized that the three biggest checkpoints, which is the mechanical checkpoint, electrical checkpoint, and your aerodynamics checkpoint, which is just your body and sizing, um, we were really close to passing all three. We passed electrical, we passed aerodynamics, and we missed mechanical by only 1 or 2 things. So seeing the finish line so close being only one or two days of work away from getting the car onto the track as a first time team was a big motivator for us to come back, um, set it full gear, and, um, be completely prepared to get on the track for sure FSGP 2026. You said as a first time team, what was that whole experience like in bonding. Seeing what went down on that track. So in terms of bonding, I think it was definitely an eye opening experience. Um, it was, so the entire trip took us around 10 days. Um, we drove 14 hours to get to, um, Bowling Green, Kentucky. The competition was at Bowling Green, Kentucky this year and, um, as you can imagine mid July the temperatures were high, um, and getting the car up. Running passing scrutineering going back again and again to scrutineers, um, we were pulling all nighters we were pulling all lights from multiple nights um we were bonding to a next level, um, but I think everybody had a lot of fun. We learned a lot we got to learn a lot about each other we had some great times and just it was just an environment of having so many teams there that were just so passionate about solar racing. And engineering seeing people from different backgrounds, different countries come together with just one mission in mind to advance the future of solar racing and solar cars and solar EVs in general was just so cool and so wonderful to experience and I think it gave us the motivation to kind of go back and give it our all and just make it to competition, make it to the next competition after that and just send it full gear.

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1018spotlightnj3_2025-10-18-12-20-45

My guest is Alina Zara. She is the president of the Rutgers Solar Car. It's a club on campus that deals with solar racing. How did you get into engineering and this kind of racing? So actually um it's a pretty interesting story. I wasn't planning on being an engineer one bit. I thought it wasn't something that I could do. I thought it was just a lot of math. It didn't involve creativity um and as a very creative person I wanted to go into some. Um, field that involved art in some way, so my plan was to go into architecture, but because of just like tuition money and wanting to stay close to home, I applied half to schools with mechanical engineering in mind and half to architecture, and I ended up getting a full ride to Rutgers and I'd applied to Rutgers as mechanical engineering because at the time it wasn't accredited for architecture. So as I began my journey. Engineering, um, I was in my mind I was like, no, I'm gonna transfer out as soon as possible and go straight to architecture, um, but obviously in your first two years you have to, you have to explore extracurriculars. It's not just about coursework. Um, I started getting into a club about, um, rocket propulsion, um, RRPL. It's a club at Rutgers that deals with you said rocket propulsion rocket propulsion, make sure I heard that right. And it was, it was a great experience, um, that made me kind of realize that I kind of liked where this was going. I liked this new turn that my life was taking from there I got involved into robotics research under Professor Moo at Rutgers, and um I ended up working under this PhD student, Noah Harmats, and we were working on this, um, 3 degree of freedom tendon driven robot. I ended up doing a lot of work under him for 2 years over um a summer putting in around like 50 hours a week and we ended up. Publishing a paper that got presented in Yokohama, Japan recently in the 2024, um, IEEE ICR conference. Congratulations. Thank you, thank you. So seeing my work out there, seeing like, um, what I could contribute, how I can motivate other people just really kind of solidified the path that I was taking, um, really kind of made me believe in myself that engineering was a path that I could take that it was something that I could do was capable of doing from there, um, my friend dragged me to Rucker solar car. They were like, let's go to an interest meeting um in 2022. I was a sophomore and I started out as part of the mechanical team. I started doing um tasks for the steering team and from there I got more involved into the break up team. From there through my involvement, I became brakes lead. I designed a hydraulic I designed and manufactured with um help from other team members obviously um designed a hydraulic braking system for our first car. And then from there I also started to reach out to industry because I was like this this is something that we're doing and it's really cool and I think other people should get to know about it so I started to reach out to industry um we started getting a lot of sponsorship acquisition and through my involvement in the administrative side of things I also um got to pick. Came business lead for worker solar car, so I was brakes lead business lead simultaneously and then from there I felt like I had the technical background as well as the administrative background to kind of lead this team as club president. I ran the following year and since March 2025 I've been the president.

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1019spotlightnj4_2025-10-19-11-58-43

It's a little past midnight. I don't know what time it is. We've been working for like maybe 12 hours, um, and the mechanical system's done, or good enough to actually get it driving. Only worry are like the small things that are just adjustable and fixable quickly and don't need to be fixed for a quick drive test. So we're gonna do our first drive test right now. Yeah. Wow, look at it go, yes, Alina Zara is president of the Rutgers solar car. She heads up this team. Oh my gosh, tell me about that and the challenges you face in STEM. Whoa, I'm impressed. So that was actually a video from competition and that was the very first time that our car that we built over um 3 years was finally driving for the first time it was that competition um emotions were high, um as you could as you could see it was great um my experience in STEM, I would definitely say like as a woman, as an immigrant there were a lot of challenges that came through my journey um you realized as you went on that. People just tend to look at you different, right, um, as. A woman with a hijab on my head, it was really hard to kind of prove myself just by looking a certain way um my male peers would be able to go talk to people and just be heard and um their opinions would be taken into consideration but for me it just felt like I had to constantly prove myself, um, constantly network to make sure that my skills were being shown not just. You know overlooked just because of how I looked, um, it was definitely a struggle at first it was a big learning curve to kind of go through that make sure that um I was being extra loud in meetings to make sure my points were heard, making sure that my work could speak for itself, making sure I was networking with professors with industry professionals at career fairs to to show myself to put myself out there, um. To show everyone that women can also go into engineering even though we're women like it's not and you don't see a lot of women in it even though you don't more exactly um I think there's only about 15% of women that are currently engineers in the United States and for mechanical engineering it's even less I think it's only 10% of the women that are 10% of all people that are mechanical engineers are women. And when you look at the women at NASA and. Movie Hidden Figures you know women have the smarts for it. They do, they definitely do. I think women tend to underestimate themselves a lot seeing it be so populated by men. I think they tend to doubt their skill set um and their capabilities, but that's just not true at all. Um, women are just as capable and just as smart and just as strong to achieve the things they want to achieve. um, it is true that they will have. To work extra hard to make uh to prove themselves to show everyone that they can, but I think in order to get to a point where that's not something that the new women of our like the next generation have to deal with, um, we have to put ourselves out there we have to put in the work to put ourselves in those leadership positions to excel at what we do, um, and to show that the new generation that this is something that we can do this is normal.

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1019spotlightnj5_2025-10-19-12-00-03

Alina Zara is my guest here on Spotlight New Jersey. She is the president of Rutgers Solar Car. Let's talk about your next phase of competition coming up in July of 2026. Yes, of course. So July of 2026, um, this year we're working on the car still from July 2025, um, we're optimizing it, making sure that it's better than before, because once, like I talked about, once you get. On the track for FSGP, the next phase of the competition after 3 days, it's ASC. So FSGP kind of serves as a qualifier. FSGP takes place every year, but ASC, American Solar Challenge, happens every 2 years, and that race is absolutely insane. Um, it's cross country, it's over 2000 miles. It takes place on historic trails like the Oregon Trail it's very popular, um. You're going on US highways. You have a lead car, you have a chase car you're going on US highways for 7 days straight, um, camping on the side of highways, there's no hotels, you just kind of go, um, and we're hoping to make it there. So if we get on the track at FSGP, um, there's a certain amount of laps you have to do in the track race, and if you qualify you get to go on to ASC and that is our hope. So when if we optimize our car from last year. Um, we're kind of hoping that we can make it structurally sound, make it, um, make our battery last over the course of FSGP and ASC because ASC takes place 3 days after FSGP. How in the world do you prepare for this? It sounds like a lot of work. So there's 3 phases I would say. Um, we start off in the design phase we start off 3D modeling our entire car, every single component makes sure that it fits. We run simulations, um, we make sure that the car is aerodynamic, it cuts through air the way we want it to, um. Again, that everything fits together and is structurally sound together um, once we are done with that and we are content with our design, we kind of go into the manufacturing state um so mechanical, electrical, and aerodynamics, they will work simultaneously to um manufacture all of our mechanical components that includes brakes, steering, chassis, um, and then the electrical team is gonna work on all of the stuff that drives the car, right, solar, high voltage, low voltage. And then the aerodynamics team is gonna work on the outer shell of the car which is encompassed of a top shell, the top part of the car, the bottom shell, the bottom part of the car, and a canopy that goes where the driver sits. Um, while they're working on that, um, and once the car is designed, we then go into our testing phase. We put everything together and then we go through all the tests that will be required of us at competition. That means driving at certain speeds, driving through certain weather, driving just generally just driving the car around 100 miles to see if it can hold up.

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1019SPOTLIGHTNJ6_2025-10-19-12-27-23

I am speaking with Alina Zara. She's the president of Rutgers Solar Car. You all take your work out into the community. Explain. So. We're building a car, but at the end of the day all of us are really passionate about sustainability, about green energy, about just solar racing and the future of solar racing, solar vehicles in general so one thing we like to do is we like to mark our footprint in the community we like to introduce ourselves, um, to, to the new generation to people and to the sustainability community and we go to. A lot of electrical vehicle expos. I think we've done some in Chatham, some in Verona, um, we also like to go to libraries and give presentations to little children to just show that solar racing is possible. um, a lot of community outreach events we go to the New York Auto Show that happens, um, every single year we're planning we went last year for the first time and we're go go again this year. I'm just putting our name out there, um, getting published in sustainability newsletters, making sure the community knows that this is an avenue that is emerging, that's something we could do. Approachable one that people can pursue you have sponsors you want to give credit to. Yes, um, so there are a lot of sponsors uh again, um. Solar racing is a very expensive sport. If we were to completely um outsource our car, it would cost upwards of $300,000. So we definitely, um, really, really are grateful to all of our sponsors that helped make this possible for us, for us to get to competition for us to have the resources that we need for us to design the car and the vision that we see it in. Um, truly, truly grateful and also truly, truly grateful for my team for all of the hard work that they put in for all of the, the outreach that they do for all of the work that they do for all of the sleepless nights and design work and how committed they are and also for giving me the opportunity to be in this position and. Kind of lead them and represent our club. I truly truly am so grateful. I don't blame you. You must feel really good about the fact that you are a good solid strong leader and you do want to inspire the next generation. When you see those little faces uh in the libraries where you go speak, what does that do for you? It's honestly just very inspiring just to see because you go into these libraries, you go into these high schools and you're like oh nobody's gonna care but you see these young children with their eyes just full of glory and they're like oh my God I we couldn't we didn't know that a car could look like that or we didn't know that the son could drive a car and they're just so very fascinated. That it just makes you more motivated about the work you're doing so you're like wow, this really is just so cool because you get so lost in like the little things the technical aspects or the administrative things or hung up on things that go wrong you forget the whole point that this is just an insanely cool engineering project that we get to work at every single day.

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News 12's Della Crews spoke to president Alina Zahra to learn more about the group.

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