Background-Remediation: I joined the EWRE program in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the height of the Superfund Initiative, when external needs influenced programs to emphasize process understanding and technology designs for site remediation.  In this period, I developed and taught microbiology and remediation courses. 

Sustainability:  In the changing political and social climate, faculty and students alike became  involved in the policy-economic-environment paradigm, resulting in interest and courses in sustainability, i.e. focus on low environmental impact designs with business and policy value.  I decided to galvanize the CEE disciplines around green building designs in the CEE design course, and am currently teaching Sustainability Finance to underscore the need to take into account the financial boundary condition to design solutions for sustainability.

Entrepreneurship:  More recently, concepts of value creation and entrepreneurship are being emphasized and the engineering and business disciplines more integrated.  Through the Zell Lurie Institute’s Williamson Initiative, we started integrating business fundamentals in engineering education, and provide technological depth in business education in 2006. 

Our philosophy is that entrepreneurship needs to be taught from the perspective of an Entrepreneurial Arch, bridging capabilities and business.  My courses focus on the left side of the arch to help students identify high value opportunities, design the business (using business model iteration), and assess the business design BEFORE operationalizing the venture.  We teach these concepts by way of using value chain, strategy, finance, and marketing tools to test the business hypothesis.  Only then does it make sense to unlock the business potential (KeyStone Compact © 2012 CleanTech Acceleration Partners) and develop plans and move towards due diligence and growth management (see other courses in Arch)