Dr. Rachel Penton selected as an Engineering Fellow for 2022 | Department Of Psychology and Neuroscience

The designation as an Engineering Unleashed Fellow recognizes Dr. Penton’s leadership in engineering education, distinguished both through her Fellows project and through her interactions with the greater Engineering Unleashed community. The Fellowship will enable advancing entrepreneurially minded learning at our campus and beyond. This year, twenty-one individuals from sixteen higher education institutions across the country have been named 2022 Engineering Unleashed Fellows.

This fellowship will allow Dr. Penton to continue her research on using making in STEM classes by funding her development and study of a faculty toolkit for implementing mini-maker projects into STEM courses to promote entrepreneurial-minded learning. She piloted the approach in her 120-student Neuropsychopharmacology course and it seemed to go well!

The nomination and naming process began with Dr. Penton’s initiative to participate in one of the many Engineering Unleashed Faculty Development workshops. These workshops are designed and delivered by a collaborative group of subject matter experts who serve as faculty members at more than twenty institutions. The workshops attract faculty participants from across the country, focusing on the development and application of an entrepreneurial mindset whether in teaching and learning, research, industry, or leadership. Working with peer coaches for up to a year, Dr. Penton completed the work and contributed to the Engineering Unleashed community through an online publication, sharing within the platform known as EngineeringUnleashed.com. The workshop’s peer coaches then nominated her. The subsequent application was rated by an independent peer review committee of past Fellows. Her recognition and selection as a Fellow represents less than 10% of the overall faculty development participants, so her work is the best of the best as identified by her own peers.

Through her Engineering Unleashed Fellowship, Dr. Penton will be equipped to amplify the outstanding ideas and online content she may have created as a result of the faculty development workshop she attended. The goal is to enhance the development of an entrepreneurial mindset in undergraduate engineering students.

Each Fellowship is accompanied with:

Recognition: The Fellows will be honored by an announcement on the Engineering Unleashed website and by a letter similar to this one, notifying the president, provost, and dean at the Fellow’s university or institution of the fellowship award, highlighting the Fellow’s contribution and work.

Advanced Project Work: The Fellows will have the opportunity to further advance their project/module, develop a new project/ module, participate in conferences, and promote their work.

Funding: Through their home institution, the Fellows will each be awarded a $10,000 grant that can be used to advance their project/module, pay for part of their salary, develop a new product/ module, participate in conferences, support undergraduate student assistants, etc.

Community: The 2022 Engineering Unleashed Fellows cohort will be able to meet, share ideas, and learn about each other’s projects through a virtual meeting on Tuesday, October 24, 2022, at 1:00pm CT.