JMU's Eco-Friendly Engineering
By CAROLINE COURNOYER
HARRISONBURG, Va. -- As anxiety over the impact of global warming intensifies, James Madison University (JMU) is planning to open a School of Engineering in 2008 that which will focus on designing environmentally-friendly technology.
“I think this is a great idea because we already have plenty of engineers to build commercial things that are harmful to our environment, but we need people to counteract those inventions,” sophomore Megan Black said. “Without a healthy environment, we as people cannot live our lives to the fullest.”
The general engineering major will focus on sustainability, meaning that the process of designing products must consider the environmental, economic and social consequences of technology.
“It’s a key to the future of our society in particular and especially how we design things in the future,” said Dr. Robert Prins, the first professor hired for the program. “We need to take sustainability issues into account.”
Ideally, JMU students graduating with an engineering degree will have learned to design products that do not deplete, diminish, or degrade the environment, according to the School of Engineering website.
“There’s national need for the future engineer to have a broader perspective,” engineering professor Olga Pierrakos said.
Prins said that rather than just perfect the technological side of engineering, students also will gain an understanding of environmental, economic and social concerns.
For example, when building a bridge, an engineer trained in sustainability must not only consider traditional matters such as bridge material but also how that bridge will affect the ecology of the river bottom, according to Prins.
“This is a lab-intensive curriculum and that’s a good thing,” Prins said about the 21-lab credit major. “We want to make sure when you leave here that you not only know how to think about things but you can actually do things in the lab.”
Based upon emails from high school students, Prins expects a lot of interest in the program. The school is planning for class sizes of approximately 50 students, but internal transfers may increase that number.
For Manassas high school senior Timmy Austin, the emphasis on sustainability is necessary for “making better decisions on what you do so it won’t hurt the environment but rather help it.” He plans to enroll in the program if accepted to JMU.
Unlike a typical engineering major, this degree will also train students to think like a business executive, according to Prins.
“The idea for this engineering degree is that it’s going to bring together a variety of skills,” Prins said. “What we are trying to do is prepare a new kind of engineer; somebody that not only has the technical background but also has the ability to communicate between business fields and is well based in practical business knowledge.”
Required business courses will include Business Management of Technology I/II and two Gen-Ed courses.
The integration of business courses gives students more options, which incoming students find appealing.
“This program is just different from anything else I’ve seen and there’s a lot of diversity between the subjects,” high school senior Zachary Clarke said. The combination of engineering and business is good because it makes you flexible enough to change your path after college, he said.
After spending four years and thousands of dollars, most students want to graduate with jobs lined up. The easiest way to guarantee income after college is to major in fields with high labor demand, and 20 percent of current engineers will retire within the next decade.
The Shenandoah Valley Partnership predicts that they will need an additional 1,661 engineers by 2012, the year of the first graduates from the program. The 70-credit major will award students a Bachelor of Science in general engineering. Currently, there are no admission requirements into the major.
On November 3rd, an open house was held for interested students. “From what I just heard it sounds like a really intense course,” Richmond high school senior Andrew Rankin said. “It sounds like they’re really trying to make this work and I would like to be apart of it.”
“I think in the long run the addition of the School of Engineering will hopefully raise the awareness level of the public about our majors in the science, engineering and math areas,” Director of Admissions Michael D. Walsh said.
Walsh is unsure if the new school will increase applicants overall, but expects it to increase the number of science, technology, and math majors.
“I think the new school will make JMU seem a lot more appealing to students,” Black said. “It’s always good to have a lot of different kinds of people interested in different things in one place.”