Purdue programs engage Indiana
INDIANAPOLIS - Purdue on Thursday (April 7) released an annual report of its engagement efforts at a committee meeting of the university's Board of Trustees.
Victor Lechtenberg, vice provost for engagement, said, "Our mission is to empower Indiana to achieve prosperity in a global economy and improve quality of life. We also strive to strengthen learning and discovery programs, making them stronger, more relevant, better focused and more valuable to the people of Indiana."
The efforts he highlighted included:
* The Technical Assistance Program completed projects with 541 employers in 82 counties in 2010. These employers reported $54 million in increased or retained sales, $6.8 million in cost savings, $26 million in capital investments and 1,098 jobs created or retained.
* Purdue and Indiana universities are taking their technology on the road to connect with investors and entrepreneurs. Technology Showcases for these commercialization-ready technologies were held in Evansville and New Albany while a third will be held in Columbus later this year. Several business development discussions have resulted from these showcases, and more road trips are planned in other parts of the state, including Fort Wayne and Merrillville.
* Local economic development organizations and agencies have partnered with the Purdue Center for Regional Development to provide economic cluster analyses and demographic data to help inform local policy and planning. Since 2005 the center has worked with more than 100 different community, state and national entities.
* Purdue Cooperative Extension Service engaged more than 1.4 million Hoosiers in Extension programs and more than 3 million people visited its Purdue Extension website for assistance.
* In 2010 the Crop Diagnostic Training and Research Center developed and conducted 16 state-of-the-art training workshops. A total of 687 people - who have an impact on nearly 11 million acres of farmland in the Midwest - attended.
* Service learning programs, which help Purdue students address community needs, expanded to serve 3,327 for 2009-2010, up from 1,299. One example is the National Science Foundation's Math Science Partnership with the Lafayette, Tippecanoe, Taylor Community and Plymouth school corporations in Indiana. The project will help students in grades 3-6 learn science and mathematics through problem-solving using the engineering design process. The project will span five years and will impact about 200 in-service teachers, 100 pre-service teachers and about 5,000 students.
* Purdue's colleges and schools have worked with the Indiana-STEM Resource Network to improve teaching of science, technology, engineering and math in K-12 schools. One example is the Indiana Science Initiative, a collaborative effort with the Department of Education and the Lilly Foundation, which provided hands-on training for 1,050 elementary and middle school science teachers in summer 2010. These teachers are implementing outcome-based science curricula in 250 schools across Indiana, reaching nearly 50,000 students with creative and exciting science curricula.
* The university also expanded online distance-learning efforts, with enrollments growing nearly 75 percent since 2005.
Engagement programs are funded largely by those who benefit, with additional support from the university and the state.
Writer: Jeanne Norberg, 765-494-2084, jnorberg@purdue.edu
Source: Victor Lechtenberg, vll@purdue.edu