Personal Statement

Thank you for reviewing my credentials as I apply for a tenure-track faculty position in the mechanical engineering program. I am excited to have this opportunity for the following reasons.

Teaching broadly within mechanical, materials, manufacturing and general engineering at all levels, has always been my career goal. My teaching and research interests transcend the 5 areas mentioned in the job announcement. The vast majority of my students have been mechanical engineering.

Project work both outside of and within courses are key to effective engineering education. I have made it a point to include design projects into courses whenever practical. Whenever I did so in Fr/So courses the students frequently told me “you don’t realize it,

I wanted to improve engineering education (both teaching and research) and felt the best way was to be part of something new. I developed new courses and conducted research using undergraduates.

In July 2001 I joined the Manufacturing Engineering faculty at Kettering University. I brought two NSF Grants to Kettering and received a third. Two masters students were fully funded and undergraduates actively participated in this work. My system of advising went beyond schedule checking. Each advisee chose a graduation plan which included the best combination of courses for each term. I piloted improving the freshman seminar by using Google Apps for education.

I examined the GE, EM, and ME courses. Based on this initial review, I feel I could teach 17 undergraduate and 5 graduate courses. I did not include courses associated with seminar, project, independent study etc. I also did not consider what appeared to be 400/500 level combination courses as 2 courses and considered them to be UG. I did include the “systems design courses”. I did not include courses, I would like to teach and feel somewhat prepared nor those outside the three

Shared governance gives faculty, both, a tremendous opportunity and a tremendous responsibility. I took both seriously as an active participant in such activities. My service to the university, also involved helping colleagues at Kettering learn about teaching with technology, My service to the discipline includes active participation in ASEE and other societies, MatEdU (an NSF funded consortium), and NCEES. My experience as an Item Writer for both the FE and PE exams helped me significantly reduce DFW rates in courses without sacrificing student learning. One of the things I will miss the most about Kettering is the Sr. Thesis where a student carries out a project to benefit their company. This is jointly supervised by a faculty member and an employer advisor. Each thesis was an opportunity to perform general service to external constituents. I did my best to take advantage of each unique