![]() ![]() I think that will generate better research and more cutting-edge research.”Įngineering has come a long way from drafting tables and wood shops. We need to collaborate because of the fact that we’re not as big that’s an advantage to us. He sees the smaller size of UVA’s Engineering School-and the potential for collaboration with 10 other schools on Grounds-as an advantage. For example, Tech’s College of Engineering employs around 350 faculty members teaching roughly 10,050 students, whereas UVA’s Engineering School has around 150 faculty members teaching roughly 3,280 students.īut size and rank aren’t everything, says electrical engineering professor and former dean James Aylor (Engr ’68, ’71, ’77). News & World Report rankings, such as those at Virginia Tech and UC Berkeley. UVA’s Engineering School is smaller than other state schools’ engineering programs that consistently rank higher in U.S. One of the school’s newest buildings-Rice Hall, built in 2011-was created with interdisciplinary work in mind, Benson says: Its six floors are made up of computing, design and robotics labs, as well as open collaborative spaces where students from all departments work together at tables, white boards and 3-D printers. About 17 percent of the school’s faculty are women.Īnother breakthrough: the emphasis on collaboration. ![]() This year, about 32 percent of the school’s undergraduate students were women, as well as 28 percent of its graduate students. A few women had gone through the program, and a few women, such as Doris Kuhlmann-Wilsdorf, served on the faculty, but full coeducation “was a real kick-start” to improving the quality of the school, Cahen says. The “most remarkable” thing to happen to the school over the past century was the advent of full undergraduate coeducation in 1970, says materials science professor George Cahen (Engr ’70, ’76). (After the Three Mile Island accident and the Chernobyl disaster, student interest in nuclear engineering faded the reactor was shut down in 1998.) In the 1980s, the school offered degrees in a number of interdisciplinary programs, such as biomedical engineering, systems engineering and computer science, with a focus on research throughout its programs. At the start of the ’60s, UVA was one of the few schools in the nation to have its own nuclear reactor facility. In 1955, the school established a modern graduate program, offering a doctor of science degree for the first time. In 1935, the school moved from Cocke Hall to just-built Thornton Hall and enjoyed new labs and equipment. The 20th century was a period of “remarkable transformation for engineers,” Benson says. That back issue of Alumni News serves as both time capsule and benchmark of just how far the applied science program has come in 100 years’ time. They’re designing their own electric guitars. They’re looking at heat transfer on the atomic level to make computers and electronics more energy efficient. Students and faculty are creating biological models for medical residents, using polyjet 3-D printers. Today, there’s a lot more problem-solving going on at the E-School than paved roads. ![]()
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