The Pratt School of Engineering and the Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences are set to collaborate on a new center devoted to the study of environmental issues.
President Richard Brodhead-along with Robert Clark, interim dean of Pratt, and Bill Chameides, dean of the Nicholas School-will introduce the Gendell Center for Engineering, Energy and the Environment at a press conference this afternoon.
The center, which initially will be housed in Hudson Hall Engineering Building, is being endowed by Jeffrey Gendell, Trinity '81, and his wife Martha, who are providing $10 million of the $12 million the University will raise for the effort.
"The Gendell Center is a wonderful example of Duke's strategy to make a difference by building on its special strengths in collaboration to address real-world problems," Brodhead said in a statement.
Tod Laursen, senior associate dean for education in Pratt, will be the first director of the center, which aims to provide graduate and undergraduate students with facilities that will allow them to investigate environmental issues.
Gendell said the center will address a demand for more courses related to matters of the environment.
"What the Pratt people wanted was more exposure to the environment," he said. "The environment is this massive problem-solving issue that's going to permeate a lot of what we do."
Gendell said the engineering school's involvement will allow undergraduate students to be major participants in the center's programs.
"A lot of this is going to be geared toward undergraduates," he said. "The Nicholas School is graduate-oriented, so there weren't enough [environment-based] courses for undergraduates. This is going to increase that dramatically."
In addition to housing faculty and students devoted to innovative research in their fields, the center will offer a new certificate program in energy and the environment that is open to all undergraduate students.
Laursen said environmental issues are extremely relevant, and he expects the center to engage students on the topic.
"First are the technical problems that the center is going to be addressing, which are arguably some of the most important issues of our generation," Laursen said. "The major project is engaging students in big problems, not hypothetical ones."
The center will offer its inaugural course this spring, with the program's full launch occurring Fall 2008, Gendell said.
Gendell added that he hopes the interdisciplinary nature of the center will encourage not only Pratt undergraduate students to participate, but also Trinity College of Arts and Sciences students.
"My goal is to have a Trinity student take a few introductory classes and not be afraid to take a lab," he said. "If we do this right, we'll have art history majors and English majors taking labs."
The press conference will take place at 1:30 p.m. today in the engineering school's Schiciano Auditorium. The event is open to the public.
Wenjia Zhang contributed to this story.
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