Training the next generation of engineers
STILLWATER — Engineering majors at Oklahoma State University are applying concepts learned in the classroom and exploring their own ideas in the newest building on campus. Endeavor is filled with laboratories and stateof-the-art technology that invite students from all disciplines to learn by doing.
“It’s really an incredible facility and may be unique in the country,” OSU President Burns Hargis said. “It’s for undergraduate research, so it’s hands-on. And many believe that’s the best way to learn. It will revolutionize our engineering program in many respects.”
The public can tour Endeavor and interact with students in the labs following a dedication Saturday afternoon. Activities for all ages are planned.
“Endeavor isn’t just about a building. It’s about changing the culture of how we train the next generation of engineers,” said Paul Tikalsky, dean of the College of Engineering, Architecture and Technology.
Tikalsky calls the 72,000-squarefoot, $30 million building an “interdisciplinary, hands-on giant makers space.”
Laboratories are available 24 hours a day to students from all colleges at OSU for their entrepreneurial pursuits. There are multiple 3-D printers, a suite to build and test robotic systems and unmanned aircraft, and the ability to conduct materials testing from 35 degrees Celsius to 250 degrees Celsius.
An outdoor deck lab focuses on sustainable energy systems. Indoor labs allow students to explore metals and soils, to build computer and electrical components, to visualize the principles of fluid dynamics and much more.
“I’m so glad I get to experience this before I leave,” said Joanna Quiah, a senior biosystems engineering major from Edmond.
“We get the state-ofthe-art component of everything we’re doing. It lets us see engineering put to work in real circumstances,” said Quiah, whose goal is to develop clean drinking water “solutions that are cheap and effective.”
Industry partners
Working with students in spacious, state-ofthe-art labs is a dream come true for Hitesh Vora, assistant professor of mechanical engineering technology, whose timing was perfect.
“The first week when I joined the college, they were talking about this lab ... It was like, ‘Some dream lab will come so we need your input on that,’ “said Vora, now in his fourth year at OSU.
Ideas were collected from faculty, students and industry leaders, and the dream lab is now reality.
Vora credits the architecture faculty with designing an “awesome” building filled with light
from the many windows and glass walls that let everyone watch the students at work.
Last week, he was showing students how to get information from sensors using the Elvis III developmental tool recently produced by National Instruments.
“We have the first 60 ever made. And we helped them develop that idea,” Tikalsky said. “It’s been a fantastic relationship with them.”
Chesapeake, Devon, Valero and others partnered with OSU on Endeavor.
“About 50 percent of the cost of the building comes from donor companies who hire from us and want to see the next generation of engineers help their companies grow,” Tikalsky said.
Industrial advisory boards help the various engineering departments improve and plan for future workforce needs, but sometimes that requires a crystal ball, Tikalsky said.
“We try to look four years out,” he said. “A lot of that is training students that they’re going to have to learn their whole career.”
Industry leaders all say their work involves interdisciplinary teams, so OSU teaches undergraduate students to work with other disciplines and learn what the capabilities of other people are, Tikalsky said.
Workforce ready
Endeavor has the capacity to double the size of the engineering school from the current 3,000 students to 6,000, Tikalsky said.
He hopes to enroll more Oklahoma students who are prepared to tackle the rigorous curriculum and expects to draw students from other states who will stay and increase the state’s workforce.
“Almost 1,000 sophomores a year will spend their lives in Endeavor,
learning not just the principles of engineering, but they’ll also be learning all the tools in the building,” Tikalsky said.
By the time they are juniors, they will know how to do most anything from 3-D print a Kevlar vest, put electronics in a shirt to track heart rate, make a solar cell on a piece of paper or manufacture electronic cards, he said.
“They can bring in their own ideas, inventions, projects and build them in this laboratory,” he said. “Any of those kinds of things are possible in this lab, and we know of no other lab in the country that’s even close to this kind of technology.”
After students have all the engineering knowledge and understand the capabilities of each discipline, they will take on a senior design capstone project. It will require several disciplines and will be some piece or component that industry needs.
For example, OG&E might want a new sensor system that indicates overloads on grids from wind farms, Tikalsky said. A team of 10 students will start building it, and every week OG&E will give critical feedback. It needs to cost less, be more reliable, more practical, use less power.
“Evey week they might be coming up with another prototype to demonstrate the changes,” Tikalsky said. “By the time they’re done with 15 weeks, they will have a system that OG&E or some other power company would want to try in the field to see if it helps them. If it does, you go to production.”
Students are told to reach out and find the right people for their team. It might be a student from communications or human sciences or business — someone who knows how to market
the prototype, get venture capital, talk to a city council, whatever is needed.
“If it’s just engineers, we’re not going to get a company started,” Tikalsky said with a laugh. “We just like the cool stuff, how it works and everything.”