The University Grant Subcommittee was formed at the 1994 IEEE International Symposium on EMC in Chicago. Kimball Williams, who was then chair of the Education Committee, was the driving force behind creating the University Grant program and nursing it to fruition. The author was asked by Kimball to initially chair this effort and continues in this capacity. Membership in the committee is voluntary and many people have contributed over time. In particular, Clayton Paul of Mercer University, Bob Nelson of North Dakota State University, and Todd Hubing of the University of Missouri-Rolla have been members from the beginning and have provided valuable insight into the workings of academia.
The purpose of this subcommittee is to annually award a one time grant to a qualifying university or college which will be used to initiate a regular class on EMC. The ideal recipient will be an accredited institution with a well-established EM fields curriculum in place and an interest in expanding to include an EMC class. The subcommittee goal is to find a university with all of the requisite pieces in place and by means of the grant, motivate them to begin teaching EMC on a regular basis. A university with an EMC curriculum already established does not generally qualify since the intent is to encourage more universities to add EMC to their offerings.
Recent recipients have been Northern Illinois University (in 1997) and University of Nevada, Reno (in 1998). The original grant amount was $7,000 but this has increased over time. The grant offered in 1999 will be $10,000.
Each year a Request for Proposal (RFP) is announced via e-mail to the members of the National Electrical Engineering Department Heads Association (NEEDHA). This has restricted the audience to the Western Hemisphere and the subcommittee is now trying to find a comparable method of distributing the RFP to all parts of the world. Proposals must be submitted by May 31 with the winner notified by July. The grant is personally awarded in August during the Awards Luncheon held at the annual IEEE International Symposium on EMC. For more information or to submit a proposal, please contact:
John Howard
1632 Grosbeak Avenue
Sunnyvale, CA 94087-4804, USA
E-mail: jhoward@emcguru.com
Fax: 408-739-1461