Doug Klein, professor of economics and the College's associate dean of information technology since 1999, has been named to the new post of director of the Center for Converging Technologies.
Klein describes the center as “an umbrella, beneath which several interdepartmental programs may grow, but the center will also encourage new interdisciplinary general education science courses as well as converging technologies content in existing courses.”
Conversing technologies is an approach to education that balances specialization in a discipline with experience in multi-disciplinary initiatives. “When we talk about CT, we refer to the interesting and important problems that are discovered at the edges and intersections of more traditional disciplines,” Klein says. “There is a growing emphasis on exploring these overlaps.”
Klein notes that for years Union has prided itself in being a liberal arts college with engineering. But, he adds, converging technologies will distinguish Union from other colleges in a way that simply having engineering has not done.
Implementing converging technologies means bringing together students from engineering and the liberal arts so that they graduate with a broad background that goes beyond that provided by their traditional major. Its first steps at the College have come in bioengineering, mechatronics, nanotechnology, and pervasive computing.
Klein notes that a number of CT projects have gotten underway during the past year:
- A course called “Introduction to Engineering and Mechatronics” began this fall with seventeen liberal arts students enrolled.
- At least one new course in each of the first four CT areas is under
development, and others have been outlined. Faculty members in physics,
mechanical engineering, and chemistry, for example, are preparing an
interdisciplinary course in nanotechnology that will be offered this year. - A bioengineering study group has sketched a plan for a minor.
- The College has received funding from the National Science Foundation and the Mellon Foundation to support curricular planning and course design. The NSF also awarded a grant to an interdisciplinary team of mechanical engineers and chemists to pursue research in aerogels.
- The College sponsored a summer workshop called EDGE (EDucating Girls for Engineering), which included topics such as mechatronics,
bioengineering, and theater communications (see separate story). - In early September, faculty members from the humanities, social sciences,
sciences, and engineering came together at a one-day retreat to begin
planning how to expand the converging technologies initiative across campus. - And over the summer a converging technologies advisory board began
meeting, with a goal of supporting the design and execution of CT initiatives
with resources and ideas (see separate story).
Klein says he is “not so naïve as to think that declaring a Center for Converging Technologies is the silver bullet that we talk about to instantly (and inexpensively) solve all of our problems. But I do think that it can help, and one of the main ways that it can help is by opening lines of communication across campus to capitalize on the resources we have. As the College develops an administrative structure that promotes interdisciplinary conversation and flexibility, then CT will succeed.”
Members of the CT Advisory Board include:
Walter Berninger, Niskayuna, N.Y.; Paul J. Burton '82, vice president of operations, Plug Power; Gary A. Cohen '78,
vice president of strategy, IBM Corp., Armonk, N.Y.; John A. Corey '76, president, Clever Fellows Innovation, Troy, N.Y.; Dennis L. Deeb '82, president and chief executive officer, General Mechanical Group, Latham, N.Y.; Richard C. Delaney, Sr., '80, vice president of operations, Pepsi Cola International, Purchase, N.Y.; Alexander (Sandy) Gelston '68, president,
U.S. Tech Corp., East Syracuse, N.Y.; Amy M. Johnson '80, president, Capstone, Inc., Troy, N.Y.; and David Usher '86,
vice president of operations, X Ray Optical, Albany, N.Y.
Representing Union are Robert T. Balmer, dean of engineering and computer science; Ronald Bucinell, associate professor
of mechanical engineering; Douglas Klein, director of the Center for Converging Technologies; Michael O'Hara, director of development; and John Spinelli, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering.