The faculty coalesced around five interdisciplinary research impact areas which transcend normal departmental silos and provide opportunities for faculty to engage with each other to solve important problems.

In nearly every blog entry I write, I mention that these are exciting times for our college. Here I go again! Please allow me to share some excitement about our college鈥檚 research efforts.

The Wall Street Journal article gives an excellent overview of why Germany is so successful in their applied research efforts and innovation. We are attempting, at a very small scale, to replicate some of this success through the efforts of our faculty and staff. This is an effort to expand, differentiate, and bring distinction to the research we do in the College of Technology.

Science Insider has posted this that shows that lectures in undergraduate courses are ineffective. The use of active teaching techniques are much more effective.

This is one of the founding principles of the Polytechnic Initiative that we are advocating as we transform the undergraduate curricula in the College of Technology at Purdue.

I made a keynote presentation at Automation World鈥檚 The Automation Conference in Chicago on Wednesday (May 15). Automation World did a good job of

We need to create a new class of engineer/technologist which is an applied engineer. My presentation summarizes why we do not prepare applied engineers in higher education and its historical roots.

Those who know me are familiar with my occasional rants related to the fallacy held by many in this country that basic research precedes applied research. The fact is there is a complicated interaction between both pure and applied research, and they are both important to supporting and growing a modern economy and nation. dispels some of the myths associated with basic research.

About a week ago I returned from our fall break and looked through the mail I had received while away from campus.聽 In the mail was a clipping from the campus newspaper, the Exponent, of an editorial titled: Professors should teach more instead of doing research ().

Melissa Dark, associate dean for research and strategic planning, shared a report titled . It is a long read but the Executive Summary gives a good overview of the report. The premise of the report is that technology can be an enabler for higher education and it is beginning to have a dramatic effect on students and higher education.

I wanted to share a few of my observations and experiences that I had at the ASEE Conference. The meeting was held in the beautiful city of Vancouver, BC, Canada. The convention center was located next to the Olympic torch used in the 2010 Winter Olympic Games and was the location for paper presentations, meetings and the vendor exhibition floor.