Jamshed Bharucha, the president of the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art, will deliver the keynote address at the College's annual symposium on integrating a liberal education with engineering.
The two-day symposium kicks off with dinner and opening remarks by President Stephen C. Ainlay at 6:45 p.m. Friday, June 7, in Hale House. Bharucha's talk, "What the Brain Tells Us About How We Learn," follows at 7:45 p.m. He will be introduced
by Andrew Rapoff, director of engineering and associate professor of mechanical engineering. Rapoff helped organize the event, along with Karen Crosby, Douglass Klein, Hans Mueller and Bradley Lewis.
Attendees from Bucknell, Princeton, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Lafayette, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and other schools will attend lectures and workshops focused on integrating engineering, technology and the traditional liberal arts. Representatives from IBM and the Air Force Research Lab are also scheduled to attend.
Most sessions are in the F.W. Olin Center.
A poster session in the Wold Atrium at noon Saturday will feature works by symposium participants and Union engineering students.
This marks the sixth year the College has hosted a conference on integrating engineering and the liberal arts, which has attracted national attention, including a feature in the Chronicle of Higher Education.
In 1845, Union became the first liberal arts college to offer engineering in response to the needs of a nation characterized by rapid industrial and urban growth.
This year’s symposium is funded in part by the David Falk ’39 and Elynor Rudnick-Falk Endowed Fund and the Laurence W. Levine ’52 and Barry Traub ’53 Endowed Lecture Fund. Previous supporters have included the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.