By Jack Boden
Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
An NC State Professor has received national recognition for innovative education practices aimed at preparing engineering graduates to identify opportunities for creating positive economic, societal, and personal value throughout their lives.
MAE’s Dr. Katherine Saul was selected by the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network (KEEN) as a 2022 Engineering Unleashed Fellow. She is one of 21 engineering faculty across the United States to receive this honor in 2022.
The fellowship is recognition of a commitment to developing engineers with an entrepreneurial mindset (EM). It is awarded as part of the Engineering Unleashed initiative, which is a community of engineering faculty and staff who are bringing EM to undergraduate engineering programs throughout the nation. This community is powered by the Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network (KEEN), which is a partnership of 53 colleges and institutions dedicated to graduating engineers with an entrepreneurial mindset so they can create personal, economic, and societal value through a lifetime of meaningful work.
The Fellowship is accompanied by an institutional award from the Kern Family Foundation, with the recipient as Principal Investigator, to advance the impact of their project.
“The overall goals of my KEEN Faculty fellowship are to 1) emphasize connections (one of the 3 Cs of the entrepreneurial mindset) and transform delivery of college engineering curriculum using adaptive learning to better support learners in the introductory engineering mechanics sequence, and 2) expand the reach of these materials and practices by sharing courseware for use at the three leading engineering programs in the UNC System (NCSU, NCAT, UNC Charlotte),” Dr. Saul said Friday.
Kern Entrepreneurial Engineering Network (KEEN) is a partnership of undergraduate engineering programs across the United States. KEEN focuses on one mission: to graduate engineers with an entrepreneurial mindset so they can create personal, economic, and societal value through a lifetime of meaningful work. There are currently 53 universities and colleges working together to instill this mindset in engineering students. For more information, go to EngineeringUnleashed.com.
The Kern Family Foundation invests in the rising generation of Americans, equipping them to become tomorrow’s leaders and innovators. Established in 1999, the Foundation is based in Wisconsin and invests in the rising generation of leaders. The Foundation aims to effect systemic change through partnerships to preserve the tradition of private enterprise. Its three program areas are Education and Character, Faith, Work and Economics, and Entrepreneurial Engineering.
The nomination and naming process began with Dr. Saul’s initiative to participate in one of the many Engineering Unleashed Faculty Development workshops. These workshops are designed and delivered by a collaborative group of subject matter experts who serve as faculty members at more than twenty-five institutions. The workshops attract faculty participants from across the country, focusing on the development and application of an entrepreneurial mindset whether in teaching and learning, research, industry or leadership.
Working with peer coaches for up to a year, the Fellow completed the work and contributed to the Engineering Unleashed Community through an on-line publication, sharing within the platform known as EngineeringUnleashed.com. The workshop’s peer coaches nominated Dr. Saul to submit a proposal to the Kern Family Foundation for the Engineering Unleashed Fellowship.
The subsequent application was selected by an independent peer review committee of past Fellows. Selection as a Fellow represents less than 10% of the overall faculty development workshop participants.
This post was originally published in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering.
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