President Philip J. Hanlon

President Philip J. Hanlon ’77 announced yesterday that significant expansion of engineering is one of his top priorities for Dartmouth. The expansion is part of President Hanlon’s drive to increase Dartmouth’s experiential learning opportunities, entrepreneurial activities, and scholarly impact on the world.

In his first major address to the faculty, Hanlon outlined his vision for Dartmouth’s next decade and previewed his priorities. In addition to expanding Thayer School, priorities include increasing the size of the faculty, adding offerings at the Tuck School of Business, and considering creation of a free-standing graduate school.

“I am enthused about the future and excited about what we can get in place in the next couple of years working together,” President Hanlon told more than 200 faculty members at the annual General Faculty meeting, which includes faculty from Dartmouth’s three professional schools as well as the Faculty of Arts & Sciences. (See full article on Dartmouth Now.)

At a time of increasing student interest in engineering and innovation, the expansion will enable Thayer to:

• provide more students with our hands-on, project-based, discipline-spanning engineering education, closely coupled to the liberal arts;
• increase access to faculty through even lower student-faculty ratios, enhancing the personalized student experience even as student demand grows;
• integrate engineering and the liberal arts in new courses and experiences for all Dartmouth liberal arts students to understand the impact and implications of technology’s role in modern life;
• increase research and entrepreneurial opportunities for undergraduate and graduate students;
• achieve critical mass in our core focus areas of research, resulting in increased funding for translational research addressing an expanded range of needs and challenges in energy technologies, engineering in medicine, and complex systems;
• deepen our collaborations with Dartmouth Arts and Sciences, the Tuck School, and the Geisel School of Medicine in interdisciplinary translational research, and in innovation and entrepreneurship.

"In the coming months, I look forward to meeting with many members of our community as we begin to discuss the great opportunities that lie ahead," said Joseph Helble, Dean and Professor of Engineering at Dartmouth, "opportunities to combine engineering and the liberal arts in new ways, magnify our scholarly and entrepreneurial impact, and build on the strength of our non-departmental structure and sense of community to fully prepare the next generation of engineering leaders 'for the most responsible positions and the most difficult service.'”