The Lowell Institute School at Northeastern University

faculty for the school be drawn from within and outside MIT, including MIT graduate students and staff from the Draper Laboratory, due in part to the fact that it was unrealistic to expect regular MIT faculty to play a central role as this would not contribute to their professional advancement at the university. He suggested that this new curriculum would require additional facilities and that long-term activities of the school could include sponsoring conferences at MIT to explain and communicate programs to vocational school educators and to consider subjects related to program management, labor relations, and the like.11 Shift in Course Offerings With the dismantling of the Lowell Institute School’s first-and secondyear electrical and mechanical courses (Chapter Six), and with the appointment of a new director, the school began offering a wide variety of single courses in the Fall, Spring, and Summer terms in topics in which MIT had both excellent instruction facilities and outstanding teachers. Subjects chosen also emphasized practical applications, with plenty of hands-on lab work to illustrate classroom presentations.

Each year these course offerings were revised to keep pace with the changing needs of the job market.12 While this is not a comprehensive list, examples of the breadth of courses that could lead to the award of a certificate included: Digital Electronics, Dimensioning & Tolerancing for Engineering Drawings, Machine Tool Fundamentals, Principles of Metal Joining, Wave Optics, Color Television, High Speed Strobe Photography, Technical Typing, Operation and Maintenance of Broadcast Video Tape Recorders, Op-Amp Applications, Principles of Video Tape Recording, TV Signal Processing & Measurement, Creative Photography I & II, Reporting Technical Information, Safety & Management in the Chemical Field, Introduction to Microprocessors, Technical Illustration, Electronic Systems Design, Electronic Instrumentation, Printed Circuit Board Design, Welding Testing, Quality Control, Electronic and Machine Shop Drafting, Numerical Controlled Machines, Applied Mathematics, Basic Woodworking, and Scientific Glass-blowing.13 The Work of Bruce D. Wedlock l 83