Washington Engineer - July 2010 Video Message
Read Matt's message
Hi I’m Matt O’Donnell, Dean of the College of Engineering at the University of Washington.
Just came back from graduation a little while ago and it was wonderful this year for two reasons. Number one we had the sun in June in Seattle, I actually got a nice little burn, and also number two, it was one of our biggest classes ever. Seeing the football stadium full up like for a football game with excited parents and families was just a wonderful experience.
It was great seeing all the graduates we had in the College of Engineering this year, but it’s interesting to note that we had about the same number of graduates this year as we did 30 years ago.
The distribution’s changed—more computer scientists, computer engineers, bioengineers—but overall it’s the same number. In that same 30-year period the state’s doubled its population and the tech economy has become our number one component of the state’s economy. Clearly we need to produce more engineers for the state for our region to grow as much in the next 30 years as it did in the last 30.
We have been looking at plans to grow which aren’t just the normal hiring more people and related things, but also trying to grow our relationship with the state and with the local economy. We have been looking at some ideas of expanding in partnership with commercial enterprises, with some public-private partnerships, to grow not only the size of the College, but the impact of the College and its relationships with its local partners and constituents.
Recently, with some of the changes and the budget cuts around the University I was interviewed about why the state of Washington, and the population of the state of Washington, doesn’t seem to understand the university very well. What I explained is to the reporter is the state of Washington, at least our constituency in the College of Engineering, understand us very well. They understand our value to the state and to the local economy, and so they are our biggest proponents for not only maintaining what we have, but of growing, in the way we’ve talked about, to support the state.
I’m also really excited about some of the leadership transitions we’ve had this year. The two latest are our new department chairs for A&A and ME. In Aeronautics & Astronautics Jim Hermanson is going to take over, replacing Adam Bruckner, who was chair for about the last dozen years. In Mechanical Engineering it will be Per Reinhall who will take over from Mark Tuttle, who was chair for the last five years.
I’m really excited to see both these guys, Per and Jim, trying to move these departments to the next stage and trying to build on a number of the new faculty hires that we’ve had in these departments over the last few years.
I hope you look at this issue of Washington Engineer, and I thank you again for your interest and your support to the College of Engineering.