Eventful

Students here at the University of Michigan-Dearborn are building a self-driving vehicle system from scratch.

It’s the only way to learn, their professors say.

The university’s Institute for Advanced Vehicle on Friday announced it has secured $100,000 to fund a project aimed at developing an autonomous shuttle for the campus. Students last semester got the Polaris GEM electric vehicle wired to drive through a joystick. The GEM is essentially the street-legal shell of a vehicle that small companies have used in the past to test their autonomous systems. It’s a low-cost entry point for startups.