On 12/2/2008 I visited the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Architectural Engineering program, my sixth sabbatical trip. Thanks to the efforts of Clarence Waters I interviewed six faculty currently teaching in the AE program, the executive director of the Peter Kiewit Institute Winnie Callahan, and others as well. As on my previous trips everyone was welcoming and helpful, making my visit both productive and enjoyable.
What did I learn?
- It's young – they just celebrated their 10th birthday
- It's an accredited Masters program – though students may leave with an unaccredited bachelors degree after four years
- It's very selective – because of the masters degree there is a cutoff of a 3.0 GPA at the beginning of the third year
- Because of this cutoff the retention rate within the program from freshman to final year was reported to me as 30%
- It's growing – there enrollment is currently about 300 students (counting those not yet past the cuttoff) and increasing.
- They have superb facilities – the Peter Kiewit Institute (PKI) in which they are housed, is designed to expose all the building systems and allow their use in classes.
- They are well supported – Thanks to the support of the Omaha business community, particularly Mr. Walter Scott, the AE program is well supported financially and has working ties to the very large AE firms community.
- They're eager to interact with other AE programs – perhaps through distance learning exchanges (they have excellent facilities).
- In particular, they're eager to attract excellent faculty thanks to their pattern of growth and good support.
- Their administrative structure is unusual
- They're part of the Peter Kiewit Institute which incorporates elements of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and University of Nebraska at Omaha as well as a large and very successful business partnership program.
- They're part of the UNL college of engineering, but they're not officially a department – the relationship is through the Pieter Kiewit Institute.
- Their explicit tenure and promotion criteria for most faculty are 50% teaching, 40% research, 10% service. So far as I could tell these criteria were used explicitly in at least the annual evaluations of faculty.
- They're very proud of what they're doing – with good cause so far as I can see.
Teaching Methods and Curriculum
- Their major focus is building energy systems, though structure is an option. The also have one of the few acoustic emphases in AE programs.
- It's a five-year program because it's a Master's program
- Anticipation of the move towards the masters as a first professional degree was a key factor in setting up the curriculum.
- They have, and make good use of, excellent laboratory capabilities in all the disciplines.
- Because they're part of the the PKI they have extraordinary opportunities to work with the large and successful group of AE firms in Omaha.
- They take advantage of that through site visits and professional involvement in classes.
- This involvement is particularly important in their capstone design class (5th year) where each team of students works with an industry team involving all disciplines that meets with the students throughout the semester.
- Construction Engineering (not Management) is another member of the PKI with strong ties to the AE program.
AE Content Issues
- BIM is being introduced into classes, but it does not appear to have a high importance in their thinking.
- Similarly, sustainability issues are certainly present because of the energy systems focus, but they were not emphasized by any of the faculty in our conversations.
- The faculty were quite happy with they way they've had the opportunity to shape their program and did not raise any other content issues.
Students
- As noted above the program is highly selective. As a result, the student test scores (ACT) are the highest in the college of engineering.
- Despite predictions that there would be trouble attracting good students, that has not been the case.
- There seems to be a high level of student activity outside classes. I noticed five or six student organizations with active programs, including AEI.
Observations
- As what I've recorded above indicates, this program is unusual in many ways: youth, support, selectivity, emphasis, degree accredited.
- They have a clear mission that has support from faculty, students (I deduce), the PKI institute and the Omaha business community.
- One opportunity that they have not yet embraced that is inherent in the PKI mission is a close collaboration with the Information Technology branch of the PKI – a collaboration that was explicitly intended by the founders of the PKI.
- A repeated topic of conversation was the tension between Omaha and Lincoln. This tension has been evident in many ways, starting with the founding of the PKI and continuing today.
- If I were a mobile faculty member with both a research and teaching interest this would be a very attractive location.
About my Sabbatical Project
- The importance of the administrative structure and the support of the larger community were again emphasized.
- The difference between four-year and five-year program's ability to explore technical issues in depth was also again apparent.
