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FACULTY OF ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY CELEBRATES 10TH ANNIVERSARY
FACULTY NEWS
On 30 October 2023, the jubilee year started with an academic ceremony at the Rector’s Office of KU Leuven. There the participants looked back on a fruitful decade and looked ahead to a promising future in which educating engineers will become increasingly important not only technologically but also economically and socially.
Ten years ago, KU Leuven gained a new engineering faculty, good for 6,000 students, 600 staff members and six campuses spread across Flanders. In his opening speech, Professor Bert Lauwers, dean of the faculty, called this moment a milestone in the university’s 600-year history. “KU Leuven enriched its impact with one of the most coveted degrees on the labour market and an extensive network at home and abroad. Each of the new campuses brought its own history and culture to the new constellation of a multi-campus faculty. Unity in diversity became the cornerstone of the policy. The faculty joined forces and organised intensive, cross-campus cooperation.”
Association
The Faculty of Engineering Technology owes its creation to the integration of engineering programmes from six Flemish university colleges into KU Leuven. During the ceremony, Professor Lauwers paid tribute to the three pioneers who played a decisive role. “The mastermind of the operation ‘integration’ was then rector André Oosterlinck,” said the dean. “When European higher education was redrawn in Bologna, he was in the cockpit as a director of the Conference of European Rectors. He came up with the idea of integrating academic college courses into the university. And the structure that had to be set up for this also sprung from his brain: the associations around a university.” The first director of the KU Leuven Association was Professor Frank Baert. He would later make himself very useful as academic director and rectoral integration advisor.
“The leading lady of the integration was Professor Karen Maex, then vice-rector,” the dean continued. “She and with her Frank Baert saw the integration as an opportunity not to merge but to sharpen the profiles of the engineering courses. That was also the reason why KU Leuven did not absorb the newcomers into the existing engineering faculty but gave them the chance to form and build their own faculty.”
Founding Fathers
Once the strategy was outlined, the operational work began. In this area, too, a trio of pioneers made themselves extremely deserving. To such an extent, in fact, that Professor Lauwers honoured them as the faculty’s Founding Fathers. “First in line was Willy Asselman, then director of De Nayer Campus. Anticipating association formation, he, and several colleagues from other university colleges established an Associate Faculty of Engineering Technology in 2005, of which he became the first dean. In 2008, Professor Chris Van Keer from Ghent took over the torch until, in November 2011, the Associated Faculty was officially installed as KU Leuven’s fourteenth faculty with Professor Kris Willems as dean. Organisationally and structurally, he got everything ready for the launch on 1 October 2013.”
New curricula
“I am convinced that after ten years, we can present a good report,” said the dean. “We developed new curricula including a better alignment with the labour market, new forms of education such as the Engineering Experiences and more attention to entrepreneurship and social and professional skills.”
“Inspired by the Solar Team - twice world champions by now - new student teams formed from which start-ups have emerged since then as living proof of the innovative and entrepreneurial engineer. Our faculty also profiled itself abroad with new, international advanced master’s programmes and a sharply increased foreign student population. With an English-language offer of almost all Bachelor’s and Master’s programmes, we are leading the way in becoming the truly international university that KU Leuven aspires to be.”
According to the dean, the most notable achievement of the young faculty is the strong expansion of applied science and technology research. “Witness the sharp increase in the number of PhD students from barely 12 in 2013 to 528 in 2023. Our engineers thus play a key role in the valorisation of basic research and its translation to companies.”
Innovation
Professor Koenraad Debackere, Chairman of KU Leuven Research & Development and of the Association KU Leuven then gave his views on the faculty’s role for innovation in society. “The application orientation of both teaching and research make the faculty a crucial player in the innovation landscape,” said Professor Debackere. “At KU Leuven LRD, we see the faculty’s impact increasing by the year. On all dimensions of innovation, it is prominent. A good indicator is the participation in European research and development projects funded by the European Regional Development Fund in which companies are also involved each time.” Another good indicator, according to Professor Debackere, is the creation of spin-offs -with CoMoveIT as the eye-catcher- and the steady growth of the patent portfolio.
Innovation may be an important goal, but even more important is the translation to the economy and the creation of added value. This is another area in which the faculty is doing well, according to Professor Debackere. “The connection of the campuses with local socio-economic life is an important asset here. The cooperation with the professional bachelor programmes on different campuses also benefits the transfer of knowledge and know-how to local needs. In time, the faculty should evolve into an entrepreneurial and decisive ecosystem that functions as an engine for wealth creation. The foundations have been laid. Integration into the university has succeeded. All conditions have been met for a future full of innovation.”
Centres of Excellence
Professor Gerard Govers situated the young faculty in the Science, Engineering and Technology Group that he leads as vice-rector. That group comprises five faculties and has 4,000 researchers, almost 3,000 PhD students and 750 professors. “With 31% of the students, the faculty is the largest in the group and cannot be left out, also because of its profile and uniqueness in terms of teaching and research.”
A long way has been covered in barely a decade, but the challenges remain great, the vice-rector believes. “The campuses must grow into academic centres of excellence around a number of wellchosen focusses. This requires far-reaching integration of the campuses into supra-local entities. That way, resources can be spent more efficiently and flexibly and there is sufficient critical mass to achieve this goal.”
Diversity
Speaking on behalf of faculty alumni was Charlotte Van de Voorde, Engineering Manager at Boeing in London. In her young career -Charlotte graduated from KU Leuven-Brugge in 2021- this driven alumna has repeatedly come into the spotlight as a role model for female engineers. This started back in 2021 when she became the first woman to win the Flemish Aerospace Initiatives prize. After her studies, she became the first female Initial Airworthiness Engineer at Sabena Aerospace at Brussels Airport. And for the past year, she has been the first female engineer in the Payloads & Interior Modification department at Boeing in London.
A rebel with a cause, Charlotte stands up for more diversity and inclusion in the engineering profession but also in companies and society. She testified to this in her remarkable speech. “With the challenges ahead, we can no longer afford to leave talent untapped. Diversity is as important as innovation. The more diversity, the greater the chance of innovation.”
To encourage diversity, Charlotte says role models are needed. “Good examples show that diversity works, that way people start to believe it. Even better is to teach people to experience diversity by creating inclusive environments. In the engineering world, there is still a lot of work to be done in that respect.”
Future
What future does the faculty see for itself? A few leaders shared their views on this. Professor Dorine Bruneel, vice-dean of Education, argued for more creativity in engineering education, not only within specialisations but also across disciplines. At the same time, she wants more attention to social and communication skills and the use of new educational technologies. Her colleague, Professor Koen Eneman, vice-dean of Internationalisation, wants to focus on developing the intercultural competences of future engineers. He also advocates the development of several strategic partnerships with top foreign universities for the exchange of students and staff and the setting up of joint research projects. According to Professor Maarten Vergauwen, chairman of the Faculty Doctoral Committee, it remains important that research stays in touch with industry and benefits education. Future engineers should also be able to benefit from it, for example by adopting an inquiring reflex or investigative mindset.
Professor Lauwers states that the next decade should be all about collaboration with businesses and lifelong learning. Just as there should be work while learning, there should be learning while working. Moreover, the activation of the alumni network on all campuses deserves special attention. “There are many thousands of them, the graduates from before and after integration into the university. Tapping into this huge reservoir of knowledge, experience and connections will be one of the priorities of the next decade.”
Yves Persoons
