Novel Illinois Curriculum Incubator Receives HP Innovation in Education Award

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign was selected as one of 10 two- and four-year colleges and universities in the United States to receive a highly competitive 2009 HP Innovations in Education grant, which is designed to address the need for more students to pursue and complete high-quality, high-tech undergraduate degree programs in engineering, computer science, information systems, and information technology.

The Illinois Foundry for Innovation in Engineering Education (iFoundry) will receive an HP Innovations in Education award package of HP technology, cash, and professional services valued at more than $260,000. Technologies such as wireless HP Tablet PCs, wide-format HP DesignJet printers, and remote access to high-power HP Blade Workstations from anywhere on campus, will be used in innovative ways to fundamentally redesign the undergraduate learning experience.
 
As an interdepartmental pilot curriculum incubator, iFoundry seeks to transform the undergraduate engineering experience at a time when the demands of a creative era raise the need to develop engineers who are category creators, not just category enhancers. To help students practice engineering in an increasingly complex world, the pilot initiative maintains that engineers need increased exposure to design and increased attention to the objects of engineering, who they are made for and by whom they are made, as well as a larger picture of how engineers bring solutions to life.
 
iFoundry plans to deploy the HP technology, work stations, and tablet PC's to create digital design hubs where students can explore these kinds of educational experiments and innovations conducted under the iFoundry rubric. The equipment provided by the grant will support collaboration in pilot courses in CAD/ID, between students in the learning community of a new freshman orientation course, and between the University of Illinois and faculty members and students at partner schools dedicated to transformative efforts in engineering education. iFoundry will also work closely with its Math, Science, Technology, and Education (MSTE) Office in the College of Education to support student volunteer efforts to educate local K-12 students on design artifacts and "how things work."
"The HP award is recognition of the systems approach iFoundry is taking to transform engineering education," says iFoundry co-director David E. Goldberg. "Conceptual, organization, and curricular change must work together, and today they must work together in the context of great technology, both inside and outside the classroom."
 
"Innovation is key to expanding education opportunity, and HP is privileged to collaborate with educators around the world who are committed to exploring the exciting possibilities that exist at the intersection of teaching, learning, and technology," said Jim Vanides, Worldwide Program Manager for HP Global Social Investments. "Emerging evidence from the last five years is very positive--excellent instruction combined with the right technologies is measurably improving student academic success."
 
Worldwide, HP is investing more than $17 million in mobile technology, cash and professional development as part of the global 2009 HP Innovations in Education grant initiative. This initiative follows HP's five-year, $60M investment in HP Technology for Teaching grants to more than 1,000 schools and universities in 41 countries. During the past 20 years, HP has contributed more than $1 billion in cash and equipment to schools, universities, community organizations, and other nonprofit organizations around the world.
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Contact: Karen Hyman, associate director, iFoundry, 217/244-3824.

If you have any questions about the College of Engineering, or other story ideas, contact Rick Kubetz, Engineering Communications Office, 217/244-7716, editor.