ACADEMIA

Baylor, Dayton, Detroit Mercy and Villanova will collaborate on three-year $2.4 million project

Baylor University, University of Dayton, University of Detroit Mercy, and Villanova University have received a $2.4 million grant from the Kern Family Foundation to develop innovative ways to educate engineers capable of contributing to the entrepreneurial cultures of their companies.

The goal of the collaborative effort is to form a Helping Hands Dense Network (HHDN) which will lead to a positive change of culture in the way engineers are educated by developing curricular strategies to instill the entrepreneurial mindset in all undergraduate engineering students.

“The Kern Family Foundation is eager to support this joint initiative of four prestigious universities that desire to work together to change engineering education for the benefit of their engineering students,” said Timothy J. Kriewall, Ph.D., Kern Family Foundation Program Director for Engineering Entrepreneurship. “Their graduates will be effective team players who will be entrepreneurially minded-and who will be able to deploy technology to benefit people around the world.”

Principal investigators on the grant are:

-- Baylor University: Cynthia C. Fry, assistant dean of the School of Engineering & Computer Science; William M. Jordan, Ph.D., professor and chair, department of mechanical engineering; and Greg Leman, Ph.D., clinical professor, director of University Entrepreneurial Initiatives and The Curtis Hankamer Chair of Entrepreneurship in the department of management and entrepreneurship

-- University of Dayton: Ken Bloemer, Ph.D., director of the University of Dayton Innovation Center

-- University of Detroit Mercy: Leo E. Hanifin, Ph.D., dean of the College of Engineering & Science; and Nassif Rayess, Ph.D., associate professor of mechanical engineering

-- Villanova University: Gary Gabriele, Ph.D., Drosdick Endowed Dean of Engineering; Pritpal Singh, Ph.D., professor and chair of electrical and computer engineering in the College of Engineering; and Edmond J. Dougherty, director of the Engineering Entrepreneurship Program.

The HHDN will focus on two initiatives. Baylor University and the University of Detroit Mercy will build programming on intrapreneurship, which will teach students how to apply the entrepreneurial spirit within existing companies. The University of Dayton and Villanova University will facilitate intercollegiate projects, which will allow students to share resources and experiences in new collaborative ways. Faculty from each school will offer input on both initiatives.

The three-year project will leverage industry ties to help students develop a deeper understanding of intrapreneurship and build a curriculum to enrich student learning. It will provide the students with hard skills and learning opportunities to help them develop soft skills and professional attributes necessary for career success.

The HHDN will create teaching tools that are self-contained and transferable to other schools, resulting in university cultures that value intrapreneurial engineering.The work will proceed along two tracks of intrapreneurial curriculum development and intercollegiate student projects.