Thayer-Industry Partnership

Thayer School is not the only institution to recognize a need to revise engineering education and improve the teaching of creativity. But it has a unique approach to solving the problem created in part by government emphasis on research without regard to economics or product design.

Thayer's answer is a new kind of education-industry relationship and attitude of shared responsibility- its Educational Partnership Program and Thayer Associates Program. Partners give about $20,000 annually; Associates begin at $3,000. Larger companies are encouraged to donate from $5,000 to $1O,OOO to the Associates Program.

In return Partners and Associates may attend periodic conferences at Thayer, get research reports and other pertinent Thayer publications, receive the fullest cooperation in recruiting among graduates and alumni, and have the opportunity to discuss their problems with Thayer faculty.

Partners may send an engineer to lecture and participate at the School and consult with students and faculty. Graduate students, in turn, are encouraged to select thesis topics associated with a company's problems.

Thayer already has two Partners in this new program: the Foxboro Company, Foxboro, Mass., manufacturers of industrial control systems, and the Carpenter Steel Company of Reading, Pa. Associates include the Polaroid Corporation in Cambridge, Mass., and the General Electric Company.

Dean Myron Tribus says, "Industry is the natural source of [creative design] problems. Whether the actual designs involved are useful is secondary. What counts is the educational impact of this experience."

Rex Bristol, president of the Foxboro Company, agrees, adding: "The questions raised by young, bright, inquiring minds have a good effect on our staff."

In this new education-industry relationship, the School serves as the laboratory; business the proving ground.