2011-2012 Bulletin – PDF - SEAS Bulletin - Columbia University

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enables DVDs and high definition TV.
Another exciting patent that holds great
promise is a laser-based method that
makes possible, among other things,
the sharper display screens found in
high-end smart phones. Sequential
lateral solidification (SLS) is based on
breakthrough research in understanding
how a substance is rapidly melted
and solidified. The result is an optimal
crystalline material that enables a new
generation of smart phones. Within a
short time, thanks to the innovations
taking place in Columbia Engineering
labs, it may be possible to put an entire
computer on a sheet of glass or plastic.
Engaged Entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurship has emerged as an
important central educational theme
within The Fu Foundation School of
Engineering and Applied Science. The
School promotes engineering innovation
and engaged entrepreneurship through
a range of programs and offers a
15-credit, interdisciplinary minor in
entrepreneurship made up of both
Engineering and Business School
courses. The School also provides a
four-year entrepreneurship experience
for all interested Columbia Engineering
students, regardless of major.
A Forward-Looking
Tradition
But, for all its change, there is still
a continuous educational thread
that remains the same. Columbia
Engineering still remains an institution
of manageable size within a great
university. Committed to the educational
philosophy that a broad, rigorous
exposure to the liberal arts provides the
surest chart with which an engineer can
navigate the future, all undergraduates
must complete a modified but equally
rigorous version of Columbia College’s
celebrated Core Curriculum. It is these
selected courses in contemporary
civilization in the West and other global
cultures that best prepare a student for
advanced course work; a wide range of
eventual professions; and a continuing,
life-long pursuit of knowledge,
understanding, and social perspective.
It is also these Core courses that most
closely tie today’s student to the alumni
of centuries past. Through a shared
exposure to the nontechnical areas, all
Columbia Engineering students—past,
present, and future—gain the humanistic
tools needed to build lives not solely as
technical innovators, but as social and
political ones as well.
engineering 2011–2012