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Educating the Engineer of 2020: Adapting Engineering Education to the New Century
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DESIGNING FROM A BLANK SLATE 99

relationship that enables the sharing of certain facilities and services.
Olin students routinely take a variety of courses in liberal arts and busi-
ness at Babson, as well as a wide range of courses through cross-registra-
tion agreements at nearby Wellesley College and Brandeis University.
Olin College is distinctive in several ways. First, the college is not
organized with traditional academic departments. Instead, the faculty
operates as a single interdisciplinary group, and faculty offices are as-
signed with no regard to discipline, so there is a mix of faculty back-
grounds on every hallway to encourage interdisciplinary thinking. The
steady-state faculty count will approach 40 in the near term. Faculty
employment relationships are based on renewable contracts rather than
a traditional tenure system.
A primary objective of Olin College is to develop a culture of inno-
vation and continuous improvement, with an enhanced entrepreneurial
focus. In the fall of 2000 (prior to the arrival of the first students), the
college established a two-year strategic plan in pursuit of this objective.
The resulting plan, Invention 2000, reflects a comprehensive effort to
rethink all aspects of an educational institution, including curriculum,
student life, administration and finance, admission, development, and
college governance. In each of these areas, a deliberate, four-stage plan
consisting of a period of discovery (investigation of best practices), in-
vention, development, and testing was executed.
An important aspect of the plan was the Olin Partners Program. To
establish the initial curriculum, Olin College decided it would be ben-
eficial to invite a group of students to help brainstorm and test con-
cepts. In some respects, these students were considered partners in the
development of portions of the curriculum and student life programs.
In the spring of 2001, 30 Olin student partners were recruited; they
arrived on campus on August 23, 2001. These students were involved
in a unique academic program consisting of development and testing of
components of the curriculum and other programs involving student
life, community service, and relations with nearby colleges.
Their program was organized into six modules, either four or five
weeks each, and included a four-week trip to France to investigate inter-
national aspects of the program on the campus of Georgia Tech Lorraine
in Metz. Each of the four 4-week modules was used to test an aspect of
the curriculum. The partners received “non-degree” credit for the year.
The first freshman class of 75 arrived in fall 2002. The class consisted of
the 30 student partners (who will spend a total of five years to complete

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