Endowment Funds Student Design Projects

COSTS

Since the college opened cutting-edge makerspaces eight years ago, student engagement with them has been strong—and getting stronger. While using these facilities has always been cost-free to students, often the materials and supplies needed for design projects have not been. Now, thanks to the generosity of the college’s industry partners and alumni, that burden has been lightened by a $1 million endowed fund that has been established to generate the income needed to cover those costs

When the Engineering Product Innovation Center (EPIC) opened in 2014, significant stu- dent demand for access was immediate, and has increased in the years since. A similar phenomenon occurred following the opening of the Bioengineering Teaching and Entrepreneurship Center (BTEC) and the same is expected when the Robotics and Autonomous Systems Teaching and Innovation Center (RASTIC), now under construction, also becomes available.

Not only was demand strong among students for curricular and extracurricular projects, but faculty soon began taking advantage of these facilities for new and revamped courses and the facilities also support a number of Senior Capstone projects.

“The phenomenon of, ‘If you build it, they will come,’ was emerging at an extraordinary rate,” says Dean Kenneth Lutchen. “This was exactly what we wanted but hadn’t thought that all this initiative and innovation would require quite this extent of supplies associated with projects. A year ago, we realized our increase in expenditures was approximately $40,000 a year.”

Although not budgeted for it, departments pitched in—as did some student clubs—but the students working on projects bore the cost as well. Seeking to alleviate this financial burden, the college began raising money for a $1 million endowed Student Design Fund to generate annual income for supplies.

“First, we turned to our industry partners,” Lutchen explains. “PTC and

Amazon Robotics came through with a total of $275,000 to anchor the fund. Then, generous and engaged alumni interested in enhancing the student experience stepped up. This semester, we completed the quest and reached the $1 million goal.”