Engineering remains one of the most male-dominated of the STEM fields. Only 14 percent of the domestic engineering workforce is female. Michele Grimm, dean of the College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering at the University at Albany, is a shining example of how women can and do excel in a traditionally male field. At UAlbany, she's been overseeing a newly expanded academic unit that strengthens the University's position as a leader in engineering, nanotechnology, semiconductor research, computer science and artificial intelligence. She's also been strategically positioning the college to take advantage of new interdisciplinary public/private research partnerships presented by the CHIPS and Science Act. In this wide-ranging conversation, Michele shares what it's like to be a trailblazer, why she's made it a priority to support and encourage other women in the field, what makes her college unique, and why community engagement seems to come so naturally to engineers. About Michele Grimm: Michele Grimm is the dean of the University at Albany's College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering. Prior to joining UAlbany, Dr. Grimm served as the Wielenga Creative Engineering Endowed Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering at Michigan State University. She previously spent 25 years at Wayne State University in Detroit, where she established the undergraduate and graduate programs in biomedical engineering, as well as the Department of Biomedical Engineering. From 2016 through 2019, she served as program director at the National Science Foundation for three programs within the engineering directorate.
Website for College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering
5 Questions with Dean Michele Grimm
NY Creates -- Albany Nano Complex website
CHIPS and Science Act on Congress.gov
The Engagement Ring, Episode 21: “Engineering Change” – How CNSE Dean Michele Grimm Is Preparing the Next Generation of Engineers
[Lively, upbeat theme music plays as program host Mary Hunt introduces the program and plays excerpts from the program.]
ANNOUNCER/MARY HUNT:
Welcome to the Engagement Ring, your connection to an ever-widening network of higher education professionals, scholars, and community partners, working to make the world a better place. I'm Mary Hunt. Today on the podcast…
MICHELE GRIMM:
There are women in engineering. There are women in computer science. You can succeed in the field seeing someone who you can identify with, whether that's based on gender or race or any other aspect… individuals with disabilities. Seeing that somebody else has succeeded is one of the key things to making students realize that yes, they can also succeed.
ANNOUNCER/MARY HUNT:
Michele Grimm, dean of the University at Albany's College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering, CNSE, is a shining example of how women can and do excel in a traditionally male field. At UAlbany she's been overseeing a newly expanded academic unit that strengthens the University's position as a leader in engineering, nanotechnology, semiconductor research, computer science and artificial intelligence. She's also been strategically positioning the college to take advantage of new interdisciplinary public/private research partnerships presented by the CHIPS and Science Act.
MICHELE GRIMM:
We want to continue to advance the science and technology behind semiconductors can we do more really cool things as the science advances, but we also want to make sure that we have a workforce that at all levels is familiar with what semiconductors are, what they do, what's important about them.
ANNOUNCER/MARY HUNT:
I talked with Michele about what it's like to be a trailblazer and why she's made it a priority to support and encourage other women in the field; what makes her college unique, and why community engagement seems to come so naturally to engineers. Here's our conversation…
[Music fades.]
MARY HUNT:
Welcome to the podcast, Michele. It's nice to be here. Kudos to you, you have found success. And a traditionally male dominated field. I saw 2023 report, I believe it was from the CDC. That said, women make up only 14% of the domestic workforce in terms of engineers and 15%. Internationally, not only have you broken through as a woman in a male dominated field, but you have also beaten the odds by earning and holding a number of engineering related leadership positions in both government and academia. How did you decide you wanted to become an engineer? And what was the journey for you like?
MICHELE GRIMM:
Well, in many ways it was finding something other than medicine, which was my first love in terms of science. I loved biology. I thought I wanted to be a doctor. I volunteered at a hospital when I turned 15. And the first medical emergency that I had to deal with, running down to get some equipment, I vowed I did not want to be a doctor, I did not want somebody's life resting in my hands. And this was back before the age of the internet. So I actually went and did the traditional research thing of going to the library and looking in a book to find something that would allow me to do something related to medicine, but not be a doctor, and discovered the field of biomedical engineering, which was fairly new at that point in terms of undergraduate programs. I enjoyed math, and physics, and chemistry in high school. I was fairly good at them. And so I thought, okay, this is something that I can do. And I got a little bit of pushback from my father, who's an engineer saying, “Are you sure you want to do that?” But he was just concerned that I was going into a very male dominated field and what sort of reception would I receive. Now he goes around and brags about his daughter the PhD in engineering. But it was a way to do something in the medical area without being an MD that really attracted me to it.
MARY HUNT:
Did you ever find it daunting to be a woman who was studying with, competing against, working side-by-side with more men and women in the field?
MICHELE GRIMM:
I don't think it was daunting. It was definitely obvious at times. So within my field of biomedical engineering, there's nowadays reasonable representation of women but my initial faculty positions were in mechanical engineering, which definitely is very low in terms of women. And while I had learned as a graduate student and as an undergraduate student to speak up, being the only woman in a department, which was the case for quite a number of years, I definitely had to have that wherewithal, that self-confidence to, as a young faculty member, to actually speak up and make sure my voice was heard. So those times were a little bit more difficult, but I kept thinking back to the fact that as a graduate student I was on committees with the provost at the University of Pennsylvania. And if I, as a graduate student, I could speak up, then as a faculty member, I should not be cowed from doing so. And occasionally, they were other faculty in the department who had more traditional views of things that were sometimes difficult to work with, but in general I found good support throughout my career and was given opportunities which I greatly appreciated to step into leadership roles early. And so it's just become, unfortunately the environment that I've worked in, so I would I prefer that there are more women, absolutely. But in many times, you just have to work in the environment that you're given. And I've enjoyed what I've been doing. So it's been worth any little voice in the back of my head saying, “Do I really belong here?”
MARY HUNT:
What is meant by biomedical and biomechanical engineering?
MICHELE GRIMM:
So biomedical engineering is using traditional fields of engineering, it can be mechanical, electrical, chemical, to understand how the body works, how it might break or fail, and then what can we do to diagnose or treat it when it does break or fail. In my case, I use mechanical engineering. So that's where we get to biomechanical. And it spans everything from developing a prosthetic arm, an advanced prosthetic arm to engineering tissues that perhaps one day will allow us to not rely on organ transplants. So can we grow a new liver?... to understanding how cells talk to each other and communicate and therefore influence how tissues grow or heal. And in my case, my work has been in the area of tissue biomechanics. So how do tissues fail, and specifically, injury biomechanics. So what happens in various situations that can cause an injury. And knowing how injuries are caused is very important when it comes to how can we then reduce the chance of that injury happening in the future.
MARY HUNT:
It's interesting, because as you mentioned in your subset, or sub areas of engineering, there tend to be more women working in biomedical or biomechanical Engineering. Is that correct? What would make you think that more women would be drawn to that field?
MICHELE GRIMM:
So the research that's been done indicates that women and also underrepresented minorities are drawn to areas of engineering where they see there can be an application that will benefit society. So biomedical engineering, environmental engineering, areas like this tend to have larger numbers of women because you see that direct link, I think sometimes, and depending on what part of the country you're in, what engineers do can be a little esoteric. So, you understand the general idea of engineers work in math and physics and apply science to do something, but a lot of students in high school or earlier don't necessarily know what that is. So I grew up in Michigan; I spent most of my career in Michigan. If you talk to people there, all engineers design cars. That's the only thing engineers do. Because, of course, that's the industry in southeastern Michigan. Getting people to think about how they can apply engineering beyond that is very important because engineers really at the heart of it are problem solvers. So engineers can go into any field and use their problem-solving capabilities to address whatever challenges are evident to that field. And so, even students who are studying a traditional field of engineering should not feel that they are restricted in how they can take that knowledge and apply it to improve society. It's just a few of the fields, it's much clearer, it's much more evident how that that translation to solving current problems is going to occur.
MARY HUNT:
When I think of the disciplines, and those that I would immediately think of as community engaged disciplines, engineering comes to mind because it has such an impact on people's lives. And we'll talk more about that and how you're sort of driving that home at the college, but I I want to ask you about the College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering first. Tell me a little bit about C-N-S-E, as we call it. What’s its enrollment? What departments does it include? What majors do you offer?
MICHELE GRIMM:
So we are one of the newest colleges at the University at Albany. We were founded as an engineering college in 2016. We just changed our name this past summer. And that was done based on our reunification with nanoscale science and engineering that for a while was housed physically in Albany but had its institutional affiliation as being SUNY Polytechnic Institute in Utica. So we now have four departments. Our computer science department has actually been around since 1967. It's one of the oldest departments in the country. So that program came over from other colleges. Then we have our nanoscale science and engineering department that offers both engineering degrees and science degrees. We have electrical and computer engineering, and then we have environmental and sustainable engineering. And all four of those programs offer degrees at the bachelor's, master's and PhD level. Our four engineering undergraduate programs are all accredited by ABET, which is very important in the engineering field. It means that the programs meet certain process and quality standards that are expected and our students, our graduates can sit for licensure exams. So it really is an important hurdle that we cleared recently with our last program. Our newest program is environmental and sustainable engineering. Currently, our enrollment is about 1400 students… significant numbers of undergraduate students, probably about a third graduate students… our largest graduate program is computer science. We actually doubled our overall college enrollment from last year to this year. And some of that was bringing the department back in. But if we just look at where we were just our original three departments, we increased our enrollment by 85%, year over year. So we are definitely growing. It's a very exciting time. One of the things I loved when looking at this opportunity was the fact that our faculty are, in general, earlier-career, excited to do things, not stuck in their ways of this is how we've always done it. And so I'm lucky to have a group of faculty, about 75 faculty who are focused on excellence in teaching and excellence in research and really building a community that is going to really support our students and advance knowledge. And so it's a great group to be with and I’m happy for the opportunity to lead this wonderful group of faculty.
MARY HUNT:
What distinguishes CNSC from other schools of engineering?
MICHELE GRIMM:
I think one of the unique things is that our programs are slightly different from many of those that are available across the country. Our environmental and sustainable engineering program is unique in that it offers a degree with the framework of sustainable engineering that wraps around everything that students study. There is no other program in the country at the undergraduate level with that, that focus. Our electrical and computer engineering program gives students degrees in both. So we have accreditation under both sets of criteria for ABET. That really prepares students for the fact that computers are a part of electrical engineering and electrical engineering is a part of computers. And so students really have that ability to look at new jobs that are being developed. Our nanoscale engineering program is truly unique. It’s been around since 2004 but it focuses on semiconductor design and manufacturing. Students have an opportunity to go into clean rooms and learn how to manufacture wafers and chips. All of our programs try to include those hands on experiences as well, which I think are very important for students in engineering that you don't just learn in the lecture hall, but you also have an opportunity to apply what you're learning to solve real problems. And so I think that's what sets us apart and we're really in a unique position with some of the emphases that are happening related to the CHIPS Act in the United States, so focusing on bringing more of the design and manufacturing of semiconductors back to the U.S. for national security and economic purposes. The nationwide, and really worldwide, realization that artificial intelligence is going to have a major impact on everything we do. A significant number of our faculty are using artificial intelligence in their research projects. They're bringing that knowledge to their students in their classrooms. And the college is poised to be a significant player in the University's AI Plus initiative where all students at the University will have an opportunity to learn how artificial intelligence impacts their specific field of study. So being in Tech Valley, in the Capital Region, we have quite a few semiconductor companies that are present that we are working with to look at how we can support their current employees, how we can develop a pathway for future employees to make sure they're meeting the needs of those employers. We work with community colleges in the region so that we can have students that can transition from a two-year degree to a four-year degree if they have an interest. And so we are really connected to those applications of engineering… those applications of computer science. And I think being in this area gives us that ability to make those connections and see how… students can see how what they're learning in the classroom actually will apply to industry after they graduate.
MARY HUNT:
This area really is emerging as a hub for semiconductor training, education and research. We are just across the street from New York Creates in the Albany Nanotech Complex, and a number of industry leaders like IBM, Global Foundries. Tokyo electron. Also, I know Albany is being thought of or considered, and I guess we all have our fingers crossed, as the site of the nation's first semiconductor… National Semiconductor Technology Center, which we're all hopeful about. We’ll keep our fingers crossed for that. But so there really is a lot of opportunity with your location. Yeah, that and the partnerships that you've already established.
MICHELE GRIMM:
And I think that's what's key is that this is obviously a new interest nationwide… that looking at semiconductors, developing the workforce. We've been doing it since 2004. So we are well established. We have those connections with industry. We have the opportunities for students to do internships with companies that have a presence at the Albany Nanotech Complex, which are NSE programs or nanoscale engineering programs. Our nanoscale science program actually have their classes… a significant portion of their classes at the Albany Nanotech Campus, which is immediately adjacent to the University's main uptown campus. So they can take what they've learned in the classroom and go and work in an internship just down the hallway and really see how what they're learning impacts the development of advanced technology in this area. So it really is unique in that way. And it's something that we're very proud of. We are very proud to have them back within the University at Albany fold. And I think that having that as a leader in educational efforts in this area in workforce development, so K-12, two-year degrees, four-year degrees, graduate degrees, really does position us as a world leader and definitely a national leader, in this particular space.
MARY HUNT:
When you accepted the role of you Albany's Dean of the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences you couldn’t have known that soon after you started you'd be assuming leadership of the College of Nano… what was known as the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering now, the College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering all reorganized… What was that experience of, you know, coming, thinking you're going to be doing one thing and then, soon after learning about this new opportunity, which was probably exciting, but took a lot of I would imagine leadership and thought and management to get off the ground. And, you know, it was a lot to be thrown at you at once, but you have managed it beautifully and seamlessly. Everything is up and running. People seem to be excited about it and enjoying it. But what was that experience like as a leader?
MICHELE GRIMM:
So when I interviewed in the spring of 2022, Governor Hochul had made reference to the fact that she was interested in bringing CNSE back to UAlbany, but during my interviews what we talked about was possibly having it be an institute. So, the faculty come back, we have the overarching Institute, but the faculty that are placed in whatever academic department makes the most sense. When we started the reunification process in December of 22, It was quickly evident that the goal was to have the 24, at that point, faculty in nanoscale science and engineering, become a department. So one of the most daunting things was it was going to be my largest department in the college, it was twice as big as some departments, more than twice as big compared to some other departments. I was a little worried about how that dynamic might play out in terms of faculty governance and the like, but the thing that's been wonderful is all of the faculty in NSE were excited about coming back to UAlbany. So apparently, it was a unanimous vote of support to do so, which faculty rarely ever come to unanimous agreement about anything, including whether the sky is blue. So we've been working well together. The faculty in nanoscale science and engineering are very interested in collaborating with the existing faculty. They have made connections in all of those areas. Our faculty in the legacy departments is what I'm starting to call them are also interested in the facilities that now they can take advantage of with the nanotech complex. So, in terms of faculty positions, in terms of students, it's gone very well. We managed to complete the reunification in about nine months, well ahead of the schedule that we've been given by the state. We're struggling a little bit on the final things in terms of supporting the significantly enhanced research productivity that we have because of bringing NSE back into the fold but we think we're getting all that sorted out. And really, it's been great. The faculty in nanoscale science and engineering set a great example to the faculty and the other departments. So I expect things are going to just continue to advance and grow. The biggest challenge is that the college will never be in a single location. We will have at least three locations for this college moving forward, and one of them will be at the Albany Nanotech Complex because we aren't going to try to recreate those facilities that are there anywhere else on campus. It would not make sense. So building community within the faculty, within the students gets to be a bit of a challenge, but we're trying to do things that can really support that goal.
MARY HUNT:
I would say that could be an advantage, though, too, three sites not too far apart geographically from each other, a new college facility and the downtown campus right in the heart of the community in downtown Albany. You know, I think it extends the University into the community farther; it takes our students out, kind of forces them to feel more part of the community and to get to know it and to see other stakeholders that they'll be interacting with and see other opportunities look, maybe see different perspectives. So I can see that as a great advantage as well.
MICHELE GRIMM:
Now, I think that it will provide that opportunity. So we will have the three locations Albany Nanotech, ETEC building, where the environmental and sustainable engineering program will continue to reside, and then the downtown campus. Luckily, they're all connected by the new purple line of the BRT. So it, it only takes about 15 minutes to get from the Nano Complex down to the downtown complex. And both main campus and ETEC are also on that line. The downside is we don't have the ability just to stop into somebody's office. But I think overall, we will be able to explore those broader connections into industry, into the community. So I think it's going to be good in the long run, it's, it is a little daunting to try to schedule classes so that students actually can make the transition on the bus if they're going to be taking classes on multiple campuses. But we're engineers, we like to problem solve. So we'll sort that out.
MARY HUNT:
There you go. That’s the way to look at it. Also, it kind of breaks that mold that people seem to think academia can be siloed. We’re kind of really forced to work with our partners in different locations in different disciplines toward common goals. So I think that's a net positive. You mentioned it the timing of the reunification of CNSE and UAlbany is really excellent. It comes at a time when the federal government is poised to pour an unprecedented amount of investment into domestic semiconductor research and development through the CHIPS and Science Act. How do you see CNSCE mobilizing to take advantage of any opportunities that present and also just as importantly, How CNSW can contribute to what the national agenda is, as you mentioned, increasing national or domestic production of chips, strengthening research and innovation and supporting workforce development in these emerging fields?
MICHELE GRIMM:
In some ways, for me as a college leader, it was serendipity that very soon after the reunification actually took place in August, the Department of Defense, the federal government, announced the first set of nanotechnology hubs. And the University at Albany through our NSE department is one of the leaders in one of those hubs that in the Northeast, which has funding of $40 million. That demonstrates the fact that, yes, the college has been a leader in this area, and we will continue to be a leader in this particular area. So looking at key things, we want to continue to advance the science and technology behind semiconductors. Can we do more really cool things as the science advances? But we also want to make sure that we have a workforce that at all levels is familiar with what semiconductors are, what they do, what's important about them. So again, looking at the full scope, starting with how can we let students in K-12 know what a semiconductor is, know what a chip is? Are there ways that we can get things that are not quite so nano that the students can work with so that they can build this understanding, become excited about it and consider a career in that area? Can we not only provide the fundamental technical education for technicians, or engineering education for some of the engineers, but also provide opportunities for individuals who are working on the business side, or the marketing side to have a better understanding of the technology that they are working with, similar to the AI Plus goal of making sure that all individuals can have some exposure to artificial intelligence. While we won't be exposing every student to semiconductors, we would like to expose any student who wants to have that extra knowledge, to give them opportunities for classes so that they can have a better understanding. And it's a lot of conversation with industry, with the companies that are currently at the Albany Nano Complex, so as you said, IBM, Tokyo Electron Advanced Materials… with Global Foundries, which is just up the road in Malta, with Micron, one of the new investments… talking with those companies, having continual discussions with those companies about what they need, because it’s important for us to develop educational programs, either transition from a two-year to a four year degree or master's degree programs that can actually provide their employees with the skills that they as a company need. And so we're going to continue that and have that discussion. So we're really excited about what we can do. And as I said, as a leader and as somebody for whom electrical engineering is magic, and I don't actually understand any of it, it was serendipity that I'm leading the college at this time, and I have great leadership in this field. So Nate Cady, the college's associate dean for research, is an international leader in research in this area. Brad Thiel, the college's associate dean for academic affairs, also comes from NSE, and is building some of these educational programs. So I'm very lucky to be surrounded by people who can take what is over there, and really help us expand what we can offer as a college.
MARY HUNT:
We continually hear talk about the increasing importance of AI in every aspect of our lives. You just refer to it I think in terms of, you know, faculty who have specialties in AI that are coming to, you know, all areas of UAlbany through the AI Plus program. But I'm curious, how are you going to be introducing and incorporating new emerging technologies like AI into your curriculum and programming? Will you be developing new courses? Will you be establishing K through 12 programming for prospective students to learn more about what you offer in this area? How, practically speaking, will you bring these technologies into what you offer at the college?
MICHELE GRIMM
I think we'll be doing all of that. In terms of reaching back to the students that we hope will be the next generation of engineers and technicians in these fields, the plan is twofold -- one to take advantage of established programs like University in the High School to develop courses that can be taught in the high school and students can then hopefully have college credit and get some exposure to these, but also to take fun, exciting activities back to K12. And my goal is to have kind of prepackaged activities that we can either take into an actual classroom or do as an after school activity where students can explore some of these areas. One of the exciting things with the reunification of the college is we now have a director of student services who loves doing some of that outreach. We also have an assistant director of outreach and promotion for the first time that also is constantly coming up with ideas of how we can reach out to our neighborhood schools or schools in the region. In terms of developing courses, our faculty have already been offering courses in artificial intelligence and machine learning. But we now have the goal of introducing some of that earlier because currently that's more at the elective level junior, senior elective or graduate level course. So how can we introduce some of these things earlier, maybe to generate some enthusiasm? One of the courses that I will be developing for me to teach is a Design for Society class. And this is going to be a freshman level class that will count for general education with the new diversity and inclusion requirement for general education in the state of New York and is an area where we can talk about what AI is, because I'm hoping that it'll eventually be a course that a lot of students gravitate to not only from the engineering programs, and it will be a required course in the new mechanical engineering programs that are the next ones to be developed, but also students from computer science, or students from physics, or chemistry or social sciences. I want to have a broad group of students in this class to work together. And so we can take the opportunity to introduce some of these concepts because whether you're designing a computer algorithm, or you're designing the next widget, taking into consideration what society expects what the differences are between various user populations… One of my pet peeves as an educator is that for most traditional fields of engineering, we do not have our students going out and talking to the people who are using, or will use the device that they are designing. So we have a lot of 22- year-olds, or once they're out in industry 25-year-olds, thinking they know what's best for the next widget to help somebody maintain their independence when they're in their 70s. If they don't have that understanding of going out and talking to people and understanding what their needs are, both what are articulated or maybe through observation, better understood, than even that potential user knows, we're not designing things, to really meet the needs of our community. And some of that also then brings back issues of ethics. So when we talk about AI, it's very important that we look at the ethics of AI -- the equity within AI, is it… do we have something that's being hardwired in based on human assumptions that can then affect how the computer is analyzing certain amounts of data? So having those discussions broadly, I think, are important. So I think we can do both ends. We can do the general concepts of what's important, get students thinking about it, and then also provide the more in-depth courses that will really position them to be leaders in the field once they graduate.
MARY HUNT:
It's unusual, or rare maybe is a better word to say, for a dean to teach a course, isn't it? Why have you chosen to actually teach a course given all your other duties?
MICHELE GRIMM:
I’ve taught at least one course every year throughout my career when I was an associate dean. Not only did I take teach my regular course, I often jumped in and had to cover other classes because we were missing people. I love teaching design, especially to freshmen to get them thinking about how they can solve problems. I mean, it's amazing what they can come up with, even without a significant engineering background at this point in time. So for me, it'll be a great thing to be able to do. And one thing I have decided as I tried to make this a course that can be more broadly available, is I'm going to do what I've done have previously in other classes and flip the classroom. So all of the lectures will be recorded. And then we'll use the classroom time for group projects and discussing issues and the like. So I really think the class can be scaled, which I'm excited about. So if the mechanical engineering program is approved in the fall, which I'm hoping it will be, then I'll do the first offering of the class in the fall in person with probably a small group of students, and then we can troubleshoot it and expand that moving forward.
MARY HUNT:
Do you think of yourself more as a scholar or an engineer?
MICHELE GRIMM:
I think of myself primarily as an engineer, my kids would say that I use engineering problem- solving to address any question that I need to come up with an answer to. So engineering at its heart is understanding what your goals are, what constraints you have, whether that's your personal budget, or scientific practicality, and then coming up with solutions. And so I apply that same thing for developing curricula. I apply it at home with okay, we've got to decide what we're going to do with something. Where it can't be applied. And we have a standing family joke that no one can ever make a decision is where are we going to eat out?
[Both Mary and Michele laugh.)
MARY HUNT:
{Laughing} I agree with that.
MICHELE GRIMM:
But no, I think I'm an engineer first. And to me that's very important for all of our programs, is that all graduates have that fundamental understanding of how to apply that problem-solving technique. Because then you can go… you can be a great doctor, understanding that you can be a lawyer, you can go into business, you can be an educator. I truly think engineering is a great first degree for anybody who is comfortable with the mathematics and able to apply the mathematics. My son would probably give me a dirty look; he started as an engineering student, and then switched to computer modeling. So he does 3D modeling and animation. And when he made the switch, he said, “But you always said to do engineering, if you can do engineering.” I'm like, Okay, that was my big overall recruiting statement. I was not telling you had to go and study engineering. But I do think it's a great first degree for people who have an interest in the area, have a capability in the area, because it opens doors in whatever direction you want to go.
MARY HUNT:
As I was saying earlier, as much as any, if not more than most, disciplines engineering offers opportunities for meaningful public engagement. For instance, you talk about biomedical and biomechanical engineering that works with medical professionals to develop treatments and tools and diagnostics related to disease. Another example I know of at UAlbany is our electrical and computing engineering students have been very involved with our local community in developing in-home and at work solutions for people with disabilities. So this is a discipline that can really touch people's lives and really make a difference in people's lives. How as a dean do you prioritize, encourage, and support community engaged scholarship and activity on the part of your faculty and staff? How do you build that into the culture?
MICHELE GRIMM:
Well, I think the first thing is recognizing the importance of it whenever it comes to annual reviews or promotion and tenure. Within faculty, it is very hard to encourage certain behaviors or activities if they are not recognized through our promotion and tenure process. So the first thing is to just build that in, that as important as having a journal, a paper in a journal like Nature or Science, if you are having an impact on the community that is also an outcome of the work that hold sway in terms of promotion and tenure. I'm trying to I'm trying to build an environment where interdisciplinary convergent research is the norm. Again, that becomes a challenge for younger faculty, earlier career faculty, who often feel like, well, if I do this project with somebody else, I'm not going to get as much credit when it comes to my evaluation. So again, setting that expectation up and saying no, if you can say what you brought to this project, that's absolutely fine. And just trying to encourage everybody to think outside the box, think about who they can collaborate with. And there was a lot of that before I got here. I'm hoping to improve that. One of the things that I've said if the college is going to support a seminar speaker bringing anybody in, I want at least one seminar from that individual that's at a level that you don't have to be an expert in the field to understand. So somebody with a general STEM background could come in and understand what's being presented. Because it's so important to realize that we do speak different languages in different fields of engineering and science. And we all need to learn how to communicate so that others who are not in our specific niche area can actually understand what we're talking about. Science and engineering can't benefit anybody unless someone can communicate what the ideas are. And so if we can model that as faculty our students will learn that and be better prepared as they go out into the next stage of their careers.
MARY HUNT:
Michele, I want to go back to that idea where we started about women being outnumbered by men in the profession. How can we increase the number of women who pursue degrees and careers in STEM fields? And how can we help to enhance their chances for success? Also, why is it important that we do that?
MICHELE GRIMM:
Well, let me tackle the why first. There has been a lot of research that demonstrates that we do better in terms of designing solutions or solving problems or asking scientific questions if we have a diverse group of people who's working together to understand that and work together to solve that problem. So the majority of engineers in this country are male. As you said, about 14 percent of engineers working in the workplace are women. So that is a huge gap, where when you have over half the population is women and we have that smaller representation in the workforce, you're not going to get the feedback you need to be able to really come up with solutions that are going to meet everybody's needs. One of the anecdotes out of the auto industry is that until they brought women in to say what do you need in your vehicle, most of the engineers had not thought that extra cupholders were important. So that's one of those things by realizing that women were making the decisions for most households in terms of what car they were going to buy, and yet they weren't talking to women about what they wanted to see in a car. That applies every industry, every problem in this country. So we that's why we need better, a more diverse field of engineers. But how can we do that? I think a lot of it is getting examples out to students about the fact that there are women in engineering, there are women in computer science, you can succeed in the field… seeing an example of someone who you can identify with, whether that's based on gender, or race or any other aspect individuals with disabilities. Seeing that somebody else has succeeded is one of the key things to making students realize that yes, they can also succeed. When you study engineering, there are going to be times that classes are hard. There's no way around that. You don't want students to say, “Oh, this is too hard, I'm not going to be able to do it,” and drop out. You want them to say, “You know what, yes, this is hard. But look, so and so succeeded two years ahead of me or so. And so has my professor and look she succeeded.” Having that example, actually does make a huge difference. I did not have a woman faculty member in in an engineering class at all of my curriculum. The first woman was hired into a department that I was in when I was in my last year of my PhD program. So having those examples is just really, really important. So that's the first thing, is getting people out there, getting students out there talking to K-12. Getting faculty out there, increasing the number of women we have on the faculty, we're actually I don't know the numbers, but we're doing quite well in terms of women faculty in our college, I want to increase the number of underrepresented minority faculty that we have in the college because again, seeing yourself is important to underrepresented groups when it comes to staying in the field and then really providing the support. We have issues in engineering that we don't have as many women or underrepresented groups starting to study engineering as we would like, but we also have what we call the “leaky pipeline,” where we lose people along the way. So if you look at numbers who start versus numbers who graduate versus numbers who go on to a more advanced degree, we lose people along the way. So trying to figure out what ways we can better support students and help them over those hurdles, I think is going to be one of the big solutions that we have. And that includes providing bridge programs for students coming out of high school who maybe didn't have the opportunity to have a solid math and science education in high school. Students that are given that opportunity to build that knowledge base can then succeed in engineering. But if we don't support them in making that transition, then oftentimes they can struggle and feel like it's not worth it. So all of these things, and it's something that's been very important to me, one of the things I love about the University of Albany is the diverse student population, the number of first generation students that we have. That's something I had for 25 years when I was in Detroit, at the university I worked with. And I love being back to that environment to really see that we can have students who come in get to know people from different backgrounds, see what that diverse point of view can bring to their studies, to the ideas that they can develop. And so we just need to be there to provide that assistance and that support along the way.
MARY HUNT:
What would you want to leave folks with that we didn't talk about that you would consider a gem, that they would be richer for knowing?
MICHELE GRIMM:
I think the key thing, and this applies to engineers, but it applies more broadly as well, is be willing to ask for assistance. Realize that you cannot know everything, that you cannot know everything at the start, that it is entirely appropriate to go and go to somebody more senior and say, “This is how far I got, now I'm stumped. What direction should I go?” And that applies also to individuals in various roles at a university or at a company. If you're new to a group, you're not expected to know everything about how that group works. So one of the things I established in the college was a learning center where undergraduate students can go and work with peer teachers to better understand things where they have questions. Sometimes students are not willing to say they need enough help to go to a tutor. Maybe they feel that their TA or their faculty member are too intimidating. So it provides a low stress environment where they can go in and get assistance.
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MICHELE GRIMM:
And hopefully we'll build that into them, that yes, it's okay to ask questions, so that you can learn how to approach a problem. And hopefully then build that into your knowledge base so that you can succeed in the future.
MARY HUNT:
Thank goodness for engineers!
[Both Mary and Michele laugh.]
MARY HUNT:
And thank you, Michele Grimm of the College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering. It was a pleasure, Dean Grimm to have you today. And thanks for being a good partner to us in all the engaged activities we take on at UAlbany. You’ve really been, since you’ve arrived, a great partner. So thanks so much. I look forward to lots of future collaborations.
MICHELE GRIMM:
Well, thank you. It has been a great time chatting with
ANNOUNCER/MARY HUNT:
Michele Graham is the dean of the University at Albany's College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering. Prior to joining UAlbany, Dr. Grimm served as the Wielenga Creative Engineering Endowed Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Biomedical Engineering at Michigan State University. She previously spent 25 years at Wayne State University in Detroit, where she established the undergraduate and graduate programs in biomedical engineering, as well as the Department of Biomedical Engineering. from 2016 through 2019, she served as program director at the National Science Foundation for three programs within the engineering directorate. For more information on Dr. Grimm and the College of Nanotechnology, Science and Engineering, visit the resource page for The Engagement Ring on Simplecast. The Engagement Ring is produced by the University at Albany's Office for Public Engagement. If you have questions or comments or want to share an idea for an upcoming podcast, email us at UAlbany O P E at Albany dot E D U.
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