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To ensure that our undergraduate and graduate students receive an education that serves them throughout their careers, our faculty takes a scholarly approach to the Chemical Engineering curriculum. Part of the scholarly approach is the pursuit of competitive grants for curriculum and course development from federal agencies, private foundations, and industrial companies. The peer-review and reporting processes associated with most of these grants assures that curricular modifications are novel, relevant, and beneficial to the educational experience of all students. Below is a summary of ongoing and recent education-based grants obtained by our faculty.
Title: Incorporating a Diversity of Scales
and Applications: Chemical Engineering Undergraduate Curriculum Reform
at Texas A&M University
Principal Faculty: Glover (PI), Baldwin, El-Halwagi, Ford,
Shantz, Yurttas
Funding Agency: National Science Foundation (EEC 0343212)
Time Period: 09/01/2003 to 08/31/2004
Funds: $100,000
Brief Description
The project goal is to develop an implementation plan for enhancing the TAMU
chemical engineering curriculum with emerging knowledge and technology applications
to better meet the educational needs of students and the emerging workforce
needs. This will be done by: 1) reviewing and revamping the existing chemical
engineering curriculum to expand time and length scales, expand applications,
evaluate new technology, expand synthesis content, and recover course time;
and 2) exploring best practices in pedagogy to enable deeper learning, particularly
by underrepresented groups.
Links: National Science
Foundation
Title: Laboratory Course in Computational Chemistry and
Molecular Modeling for Engineers
Principal Faculty: Ford (PI), Mannan
Funding Agency: The Camille and Henry Dreyfus Foundation,
Inc. Special Grant Program in the Chemical Sciences (SG-01-089)
Time Period: 04/01/2001 to 04/01/2005
Funds: $25,000
Brief Description
The focal point of this work is the development of a new graduate Chemical
Engineering course at Texas A&M, which addresses applications of computational
chemistry and molecular modeling relevant to engineers. Emphasis is placed
on the creative and intelligent use of commercial software (Gaussian, Accelrys)
to solve practical problems. The goal of the course is to produce graduates
who will advance computational chemistry in industry and academia, either as
active practitioners or simply as more effective collaborators with those performing
the calculations. Furthermore, we are also using the course as a springboard
to integrate computational chemistry and molecular modeling into other graduate
courses, and eventually into the undergraduate curriculum.
Links: The Camille and
Henry Dreyfus Foundation, Inc. and The
Laboratory for Molecular Simulation
Title: Laboratory Course in Computational Chemistry and
Molecular Modeling for Engineers
Principal Faculty: Ford (PI), Mannan
Funding Agency: Halliburton Foundation
Time Period: awarded September 2003
Funds: $10,000
Brief Description
This is a complementary grant to support development of the molecular modeling
course originally funded by the Dreyfus Foundation (see above).
Links: Halliburton
