Posted on October 13, 2015 - Stacey Huang '16 for the Office of Engineering Communications
Ten years ago, the founding director of Princeton University's new center for engineering education set a simple goal: "To inject more engineering into the liberal arts and inject more of the liberal arts into engineering."
"We saw technology affecting nearly every aspect of public and private life and knew we needed to broaden engineering education far beyond its traditional borders," said H. Vincent Poor, now dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science. "Our vision was to teach technology more broadly in a societal context and also to engage with the community outside the University."
This purpose was reflected in the center's inaugural programs: the integrated Engineering, Mathematics and Physics course for incoming engineers, a set of cross-disciplinary courses including an entrepreneurship class, and the first annual Innovation Forum. Over the past 10 years, the Keller Center has continued these initiatives and expanded much further.
Started in 2005 as the Center for Innovation in Engineering Education, the center was renamed in 2008 in honor of educational innovator Dennis Keller, Class of 1963, and his wife, Constance Keller, when the couple gave $20 million to endow the center. Now students, faculty and alumni from all parts of the University take part in Keller programs each year — attending one of the center's 15 courses, participating in any of 60 events, obtaining an internship to explore engineering beyond Princeton, participating in its eLab entrepreneurship program, or taking advantage of the services offered by the University's new Entrepreneurial Hub.
"When we celebrate the 10th birthday of the Keller Center, it's not only about cutting the cake," said Mung Chiang, the director of the Keller Center and the Arthur LeGrand Doty Professor of Electrical Engineering. "This is about planning the future decades that will continue to broaden Princetonians' pathways to make a positive impact in society."