MEMS Seminar: Lance Collins (Virginia Tech), "Technology Campuses Spurring the Regional Economy"

Presenter: Lance Collins

Thomas Lord Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science welcomes Lance Collins to deliver the MEMS Seminar, "Technology Campuses Spurring the Regional Economy."

ABSTRACT: In late 2010, Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his administration announced a competition to create a new campus in New York City that would accelerate the burgeoning tech sector in the city. Since then, numerous other technology-oriented campuses are developing or are under consideration in cities across the country and the world. These campuses have the expected activities of higher education, namely research and teaching; however, they carry an additional expectation to grow the regional economy. In this talk, I will share my experiences and lessons learned in two of these campuses: Cornell Tech in New York City and the Institute for Advanced Computing in Washington, D. C. I will review the elements of campus programming that work independently of their location, and others that must be designed carefully to align with the local economy-the latter, to a large extent, determining the campus's outcome and impact.

BIO: Lance R. Collins is Virginia Tech's inaugural vice president of the greater Washington, D.C. area, overseeing academic programming, partnerships, personnel, and building operations in the region. Prior to that he was dean of engineering at Cornell. In 2011, he was part of the team that successfully bid to partner with New York City to build Cornell Tech. Collins' research uses simulation to study turbulent processes. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society, the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and in 2021 he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering.

Contact

Spaulding, Amy
919-660-5310
amy.spaulding@duke.edu