{"id":2426,"date":"2022-07-30T11:00:40","date_gmt":"2022-07-30T15:00:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ece.ncsu.edu\/?p=249115"},"modified":"2022-07-30T11:00:40","modified_gmt":"2022-07-30T15:00:40","slug":"next-level-engineering-north-carolinas-future","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/2022\/next-level-engineering-north-carolinas-future\/","title":{"rendered":"Next Level: Engineering North Carolina\u2019s Future"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A funding initiative from the state legislature titled Engineering North Carolina\u2019s Future will help grow the enrollment of engineering and computer science students at NC\u00a0State and other engineering programs in the University of North Carolina System.<\/p>\n

The initiative recognizes the significant growth of science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) workforce-dependent industries in North Carolina and was spurred, in part, by several significant hiring announcements in the state by leading technology companies in 2021.<\/p>\n

NC\u00a0State plans to add about 4,000 engineering and computer science students over the next few years and hire more than 100 new faculty members. This growth would bring the enrollment in the College of Engineering to more than 14,000 students and the University\u2019s total student population to more than 40,000.<\/p>\n

Engineering North Carolina\u2019s Future will provide NC\u00a0State with $20 million over the next two years to catalyze the hiring of additional faculty members and support staff including academic advisors and laboratory personnel to support the larger student body.<\/p>\n

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“NC\u00a0State is providing the workforce, research and partnerships that are fueling the Triangle\u2019s flourishing tech industry that is driving huge economic impact benefits across the state of North Carolina.\u201d
\nChancellor Randy Woodson<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n

The legislature is also providing the University with $30 million to support facility upgrades to accommodate these additional students.<\/p>\n

\u201cNC\u00a0State is providing the workforce, research and partnerships that are fueling the Triangle\u2019s flourishing tech industry that is driving huge economic impact benefits across the state of North Carolina,\u201d said Chancellor Randy Woodson. \u201cWe greatly appreciate the General Assembly\u2019s support and recognition of NC\u00a0State\u2019s critical role in Engineering North Carolina\u2019s Future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Helping the College grow its student enrollment, faculty and infrastructure is also critical to assuring that NC\u00a0State Engineering continues to move forward to meet its full potential.<\/p>\n

While the College has made significant advancements in its research enterprise, national reputation and rankings, none of its peers are standing still, so it must grow to continue its move up among the country\u2019s top public colleges of engineering.<\/p>\n

Woodson makes the case for why engineering expansion is necessary for the continued growth and economic development of North Carolina:<\/p>\n

[embedyt] https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=wfClDCjFffE[\/embedyt]<\/p>\n

<\/h3>\n

Bigger, not better<\/h3>\n

Recent economic development announcements by Apple, Google, FUJIFILM Diosynth and many others show the rapid growth of the tech industry in North Carolina. The demand for NC\u00a0State\u2019s well-prepared STEM graduates \u2014 as well as partnerships with NC\u00a0State\u2019s world-leading faculty members and their research \u2014 has never been greater. As just one example, Google\u2019s new unit in Durham, NC, will be led by Kamala Subramaniam, an NC\u00a0State electrical and computer engineering alumna who received her M.S. and Ph.D. in 2006 (see sidebar).<\/p>\n

As the workforce needs of the state grow, however, NC\u00a0State has not kept pace with demand; last year alone, the University turned down undergraduate admissions to 1,400 engineering applicants who had a 3.75 or higher unweighted GPA due to lack of faculty members and space.<\/p>\n

\u201cThese new funds will enable NC\u00a0State to keep our best and brightest students in state, and will allow us to meet the needs of North Carolina\u2019s growing technical workforce,\u201d Woodson said.<\/p>\n

Engineering North Carolina\u2019s Future will also help the College of Engineering take the next step toward its goal of becoming the leading public college of engineering in the United States.<\/p>\n

Thanks, in part, to more than $50 million in funding support from the state legislature beginning in 2007, the College was able to add 90 additional faculty members and make major infrastructure investments, including the completion of Engineering Building III on Centennial Campus. An additional state investment of $75 million in capital funding combined with $60 million in private investment enabled the completion of Fitts-Woolard Hall on Centennial Campus.<\/p>\n

These investments helped spur a period of significant enrollment growth and research expansion between 2006 and 2018. The College reached $200 million in annual research expenditures and climbed as high as eighth nationally in annual expenditures among all engineering colleges. Along with that growth came national recognition; the College was ranked as high as 11th among all public colleges of engineering in U.S. News & World Report rankings of the best graduate engineering programs in the country.<\/p>\n

While the College has continued to operate at a high level since then, peer institutions are making major investments to grow their engineering and computer science programs. The solution for continuing NC\u00a0State Engineering\u2019s upward trajectory is simple: the College must continue to grow.<\/p>\n

\u201cVirtually every college ranked ahead of us isn\u2019t better,\u201d Dean Louis Martin-Vega said. \u201cThey\u2019re just bigger. We hope that Engineering North Carolina\u2019s Future will help spur the enrollment growth and faculty hiring that we need to close that gap.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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Engineering expansion will bolster the state\u2019s workforce and help the College grow.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1867,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ncst_dynamicHeaderBlockName":"","ncst_dynamicHeaderData":"","ncst_content_audit_freq":"","ncst_content_audit_date":"","ncst_content_audit_display":false,"ncst_backToTopFlag":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[181],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2426","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-campus-life"],"displayCategory":null,"acf":{"ncst_posts_meta_modified_date":null},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2426","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1867"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2426"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2426\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2427,"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2426\/revisions\/2427"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2426"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2426"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/my.ece.ncsu.edu\/communications\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2426"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}