What is iFoundry?

The Illinois Foundry for Innovation in Engineering Education (iFoundry) is a cross-disciplinary curriculum incubator in the College of Engineering at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign dedicated to the transformation of engineering education in ways appropriate to the challenges and opportunities of the 21st century. iFoundry adopts the view that curriculum transformation is both an organizational and a conceptual challenge, and that effective reform requires (1) deep reflection about the complex system in which engineering curricula are embedded and (2) multiple change modes to promote collective learning and doing among the complex system’s elements and constituents.

iFoundry History

iFoundry began in the summer of 2007 as a grassroots effort among five departments in the College: Aerospace Engineering, Civil & Environmental Engineering, Electrical & Computer Engineering, Industrial & Enterprise Systems Engineering, and Materials Science & Engineering. Growing out of the Engineering and Technology Studies at Illinois (ETSI) initiative, iFoundry was co-founded by Professors Andreas Cangellaris and David E. Goldberg. Summer 2007 meetings led to academic year 2007-2008 activities as well as a study of the undergraduate curriculum by the College Executive Committee. A report favorable to the establishment of a curriculum incubator was released in Spring 2008 and iFoundry was elevated to a College-supported activity by Dean Ilesanmi Adesida in August 2008.

iFoundry Principles

iFoundry is committed to (1) principled, effective, and piloted change, (2) respect for faculty governance, (3) student and stakeholder involvement, and (4) viral dissemination of and feedback on our efforts.

iFoundry first class, Fall 2009

iFoundry plans to admit its first class of iFoundry students in Fall 2009. Those students will enroll in participating College of Engineering departments and many of the courses they take will be the same as non-iFoundry students; however, new classes under development will be substituted for others on a pilot basis for iFoundry students. The Dean’s signatory authority will be used to allow these courses to count in the student’s home curriculum, thus enabling iFoundry students to receive ABET-accredited degrees from their home departments.

Current Initiatives

The first priorities for iFoundry activity include improving the first year of the engineering curriculum, the institution of HAPI themes (human artifacts, processes, and interactions) in the humanities and social science requirements, and the aggressive use of digital media in 3SpaceStudios to (1) gesture at possible directions of change, (2) promote collective learning and curriculum conversation, and (3) provide immediately useful and possibly viral new content and curriculum materials.