The E-Quad News, Princeton University

Strategic planning under the leadership of Dean Maria Klawe dominated activities at the School of Engineering and Applied Science (SEAS) this fiscal year.

Princeton University President Shirley M. Tilghman has identified SEAS as one of the top priorities for her administration. This fall SEAS embarked on a series of strategic planning sessions that were aimed at identifying key areas where SEAS can attain a position of world leadership.

Eleven sessions, held in Princeton, were completed in December. Session attendees included SEAS and other Princeton faculty, staff, students, alumni, and trustees. Leaders from major technology companies and individuals from other universities have also participated in this planning process.

Dean Klawe will now be visiting several cities, including Boston, Seattle, San José, Calif., and Washington, D.C., to engage alumni who were unable to attend the sessions held in Princeton.

The new vision for the SEAS will be launched in May 2004 at reunions.

The SEAS is pleased with the overall quality of the students who are entering the B.S.E. program at Princeton this fall, but is once again concerned by the small number of students in the entering class.

A total of 2,616 applicants for the Class of 2007 indicated a wish to pursue the B.S.E. degree, 16.6 percent of 15,725 total applicants. This represents a 14.8 percent increase over the 2,279 B.S.E. applicants for the Class of 2006.

Although the number of applicants increased, the number of B.S.E. students admitted to the Class of 2007 declined again. The 4.2 percent decline in admits is a source of considerable concern for the SEAS.

Despite a yield of 67 percent and a small net gain from the pool of undecided A.B candidates, the B.S.E. freshman class size of 189 is the lowest in recent history (see graph above).

Discussions continue about how to bring B.S.E freshman enrollment back to 210 to 230 students, a level more typical of a few years ago.

SEAS enrollments should be close to 20 percent of the undergraduate population to sustain Princeton’s distinctive position of having a strong engineering school with visibility and critical mass contributing to the liberal arts education of all.

News from the early decision pool is positive. Special attention was given to students applying to SEAS.

“We admitted 27 percent more students for the engineering degree through early decision than last year due to the strength of the pool,” said Janet Rapelye, dean of admissions.

This year’s freshman class includes 53 female students, down from last year’s total of 66. This decline also comes in spite of an increase of more than 17 percent in the number of women applicants. There are 20 African-American and 10 Hispanics students in the incoming class, each up slightly from last year’s numbers of 18 and nine, respectively.

Members of the B.S.E. Class of 2007 indicated strong interest in mechanical and aerospace engineering (MAE), chemical engineering (ChE), electrical engineering, and operations research and financial engineering (ORFE). The number of

students indicating an interest in ORFE at admission jumped significantly in the Class of 2006, but appears to be leveling off.

Departmental choices by the Class of ’06 reflect the popularity of ORFE (see table on page 5), which drew 60 sophomores. ChE appears to be returning to favor with 32 sophomores, rebounding from a low of 10 in the class of ’04.

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Warren Powell, professor of operations research and financial engineering, and Pino Martin, assistant professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, take part in the Understanding Complexity in Natural, Technological, and Social Systems session.

Graduate Students
A total of 128 new graduate students accepted admission to the SEAS in the fall of 2003. Our yield of 43 percent and our 14 percent admitted are very much in line with previous years. Twenty-seven African-American and 33 Hispanics applied for admission this year, compared to 17 and 23 respectively last year.

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Although we admitted almost twice as many minority students this year (15 compared to 7), our total acceptances in these two categories were equal to last year, at five.

Our incoming graduate class is 28 percent female, up from 22 percent last year. This is largely due to the fact that our number of male applicants was down by 8.5 percent, while our number of female applicants was slightly higher than last year.

The percentage of women in the graduate student body has increased from approximately 15 percent 10 years ago to about 23 percent in the last few

The department with the largest fraction of female students continues to be civil and environmental engineering (CEE), where roughly half of the graduate students have been women in recent years.

MAE has the smallest fraction of women (about 16 percent) over the last four years.

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This past year the Office of Graduate Affairs concentrated on enhancing graduate student life.

The Graduate Engineering Council (GEC) and the Graduate Women in Science and Engineering (GWISE) were both instrumental in organizing new events and activities for bringing students together and establishing a sense of community among students.

GEC and GWISE have strong leaders, and should perpetuate and enhance these activities in the years to come.

SEAS graduate students continue to demonstrate that they are leaders and achievers. For the fourth time in eight years, an engineering student received the Porter Ogden Jacobus Fellowship, the highest honorific fellowship awarded by the Graduate School (see story on page 29).

James Buchholz, a graduate student in MAE, received a 2003 Excellence in Teaching Award from the Graduate School and Hafize Erkan, a graduate student in ORFE, received the 2003 Friends of the International Center Excellence in Teaching Award.

Faculty
Nine new faculty members joined the SEAS since the fall of 2002 (see fall 2003 EQuad News at www.princeton.edu/~seasweb/eqnews/fall03/feature6.html).
This brings the SEAS faculty to 127, including 16 women.

Stephen Forrest, the James S. McDonnell Professor of Electrical Engineering, and Dudley Saville, the Stephen C. Macaleer Professor of Engineering and Applied Science, were among the 77 engineers chosen for membership in the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). They become the 16th and 17th members of the current SEAS faculty to be elected to the NAE.

David Billington ’50, the Gordon Y.S. Wu professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, and H. Vincent Poor *77, professor in the Department of Electrical Engineering, received the National Science Foundation Director’s Award for Distinguished Teaching Scholars in recognition of their imaginative teaching applications. Professor Poor was also named the 2003 Distinguished Teacher of the SEAS.

Luigi Martinelli *87, associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering, received a Graduate Mentoring Award from the McGraw Center for Teaching and Learning.

Curriculum
The SEAS faculty has developed a number of courses that attract students from all parts of campus. These courses not only present the science behind the technology and innovation, but they also place engineering in its economic, social, political, historical, and aesthetic context.

In addition to the courses perennially offered primarily for A.B. students, this year the SEAS faculty developed three new freshman seminars of this type: FRS 107: Computer Animation; FRS 129: Sex, Money, and Rock ’n Roll: Information Technology and Society; and FRS 137: Robots. For more information on these courses, see www.princeton.edu/~seasweb/eqnews/winter02-03/feature2.html

Facilities
The E-Quad renovation project has two principal objectives: 1) to convert former E-Quad library and classroom space that was freed up by the completion of the Friend Center into laboratories and offices, and 2) to renovate and reconfigure existing SEAS space to new uses.

The first phase of the renovations is 90 percent complete, with much of the remainder being held off until summer to avoid disruption of classes.

A second phase is projected to begin this fall and be complete by year end 2005. When both phases are finished, this project will result in 32,000 net square feet of new renovated space for SEAS.

Research
Sponsored research expenditures for each of the SEAS departments over the last five years are shown in the table above. Research expenditures have grown at an average compounded rate of 9.5 percent over the last four years.

Over this period EE has consistently had the highest research expenditures and has shown particularly good growth (+36 percent) over the last two years.

Although year-to-year growth can be misleading due to timing of expenditures in some rather large projects, the largest percentage increase this year occurred in chemical engineering, which saw its research expenditures grow by 53 percent.

Communications
EQuad News remains the primary communications vehicle for the SEAS. In 2003 the staff of EQuad News received eight awards, recognizing excellence in meeting its strategic communications goals and objectives. The awards are:

• 2003 Clarion Award from the Association for Women in Communications for best external, nonprofit newsletter.

• Finalist, Distinguished Achievement Award for Excellence in Educational Publishing, Whole Publication, from the Association of Educational Publishers.

• IRIS Award of Excellence, for External Newsletter, 2002 publishing cycle, from the International Association of Business Communicators.

• IRIS Award of Merit, recognizing the writing of Sara Peters and Steven Schultz, from the International Association of Business Communicators.

• Crystal Award of Excellence, Communicator Award, for Newsletter/ Educational Institution.

• Award of Distinction, Communicator Award, for Writing/Newsletter, recognizing the overall quality of writing in EQuad News.

• Two APEX 2003 Awards, recognizing excellence in newsletter writing and feature series writing.

Contributors to EQuad News are Director of Engineering Communications Ann Haver-Allen, Communications Assistant Ms. Peters, copy editor Alicia G. Brzycki, photographer Frank Wojciechowski, and writers Mr. Schultz, Peter Page (freelance), and David Barry (freelance).