Friends,
While 2020 has been an unprecedented year, the professionalism and commitment of the faculty, staff, and students of the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering have been on full display. As the day-to-day structure of teaching and research has been forced to evolve, the department has met every challenge, and continues to grow and build on successes.
During the fall semester, our total enrollment reached 1,048 students. Of this, 848 are undergraduate students. In the last year, we have awarded 273 degrees, our second highest total to date.
Our growth and success are reflected in the department’s rankings. According to U.S. News and World Report, our undergraduate program is the 10th best among public institutions, and our graduate program is the 17th best among public institutions.
Our outstanding faculty has played an instrumental role in these successes. The department has become a major source of chemical engineering research, with our faculty producing more than 320 refereed journal publications and generating total research expenditures in excess of $15 million last year.
The value provided by the faculty goes well beyond research. We empower our students with access to the best experts in their respective fields. The quality and size of the faculty are only increasing. In the last year, the department added three new tenure-track faculty members, as well as two new professors of practice and an associate professor of practice. These professors of practice bring years of real-world experience to their classrooms. They add tremendous value to our students’ engineering education.
While this year has presented a unique set of challenges, the resilience of our faculty, staff, and students has been truly remarkable.
Sincerely,
Arul Jayaraman
Department Head
Professor
Presidential Impact Fellow
Holder of the Ray B. Nesbitt Endowed Chair