Olin College

Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering

Olin College Seal
Type	Private
Established	1997
President	Richard Miller
Undergraduates	300 (approx.)
Location	Needham , Mass. , USA
Campus	Suburban
Mascot	Phoenix
Website	http://www.olin.edu

The Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering (abbreviated as Olin College) is a private undergraduate engineering college located in Needham, Massachusetts (near Boston), adjacent to the Babson College campus. Olin College is noted in the engineering community for its newness, small size, project-based curriculum, and large endowment funded primarily by the F. W. Olin Foundation. The College currently awards the full-tuition Olin Scholarship to each admitted student. Unlike many institutions, Olin College does not have separate academic departments. Consequently, no separate budget exists for different majors or subject areas. In addition, all faculty members hold five-year renewable contracts with no opportunity for tenure. The college was only recently accredited by the regional accreditation board NEASC, becoming eligible after it graduated its first class on Sunday, May 21, 2006.

History

A view of Olin College. The dorms are to the right; the Oval is straight ahead.

Olin College was founded by the F. W. Olin Foundation in 1997. The foundation donated most of its remaining financial resources to the college, providing Olin with an endowment worth approximately 460 million dollars. Richard Miller was ceremonially inaugurated as the college's first president on May 3, 2003.

In a program known as "Invention 2000", Olin College hired its first faculty and invited 30 students, known as "Olin Partners" to help them form the first curriculum. The Olin Partners lived in temporary housing and spent their first year after high school investigating assessment and grading methods, jump-starting the student culture, and experimenting with forms of engineering education.

Sunset over the Olin Center.

Olin admitted its first class of 75 students in 2002. This class included the Olin Partners, a group of deferred students known as the Virtual Olin Partners, and recent high school graduates. After admitting three more classes, the college reached its full size of approximately 300 in Fall 2005.

Olin's campus was designed by architects Perry Dean Rogers & Partners in the postmodern architectural style. The construction of the first phase of the Olin College campus was completed in 2002, comprising four buildings. The construction of a second dorm, East Hall, was finished in Fall 2005. Administrators and trustees are planning another academic building that is likely to contain additional machine shops and project space. Babson College shares many of its campus services with Olin College, including health, public safety, and athletic facilities.

The Olin experiment

Olin College attempts to set itself apart from traditional engineering schools through its focus on project-based and team-based learning, its interdisciplinary approach, its unique organizational structure, and its practice of providing full-tuition scholarships to all accepted students. Because Olin College is a new school, it has little institutional inertia to overcome when adopting new practices.

Much of Olin College's curriculum is built around hands-on engineering and design projects. This project-based teaching begins in a student's freshman year and culminates in two senior "capstone" projects. In the engineering capstone, Senior Consulting Program for Engineering (SCOPE) student teams are hired by corporations, non-profit organizations, or entrepreneurial ventures for real-world engineering projects. In the Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences (AHS) or Entrepreneurship ("E!") capstone, students work on a self-designed project relating to their focus.

All accepted students receive the Olin Scholarship, which pays for tuition in full. This tuition also covers cross-registration with Babson College, Wellesley College, and Brandeis University. Although Wellesley College has an all-female student body, cross-registration is available for both male and female Olin students. Olin also shares clubs and intramural sports with the aforementioned colleges. Olin College also allows students to receive funding and non-degree college credit for "Passionate Pursuits", student-defined personal projects that the college recognizes as having academic value.

In addition to the Olin Scholarship, Olin College provides financial aid in form of need-based grants. These grants are paid when it is determined that the student is in need of more than $2,500 a year, which the school expects students to be able to obtain through part-time and summer work.

Academics

Olin College's academic culture is heavily influenced by the school's honor code. Students often take exams on their own time and are generally allowed to use outside resources on exams. Students are trusted to adhere to the rules and limits specified for each exam without the supervision of a proctor. Because of this, honor code violations in an academic context are treated far more seriously and formally than social violations.

In general, the academic culture at Olin College is highly informal. Unlike most colleges and universities, some members of the upper administration teach classes alongside other faculty members. Teachers and administrators at Olin College are generally very receptive to student suggestions. This is viewed as especially important because Olin College is a new school, and its students play an active role in shaping the college for future generations.

Olin College currently offers three majors: Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE), Mechanical Engineering (ME), and a General Engineering degree. Within the General Engineering program, students may concentrate on Computing (E:C), Bioengineering (E:BE), Materials Science (E:MS), Systems Design (E:SYS), or they may design their own concentration with the administration's approval. Students also have access to an accelerated M.S. in Technological Entrepreneurship program at Babson College, with the potential to obtain this degree one semester after graduating from Olin College.

Classes at Olin College emphasize the importance of context and attempt to take an interdisciplinary approach. Freshman take integrated course blocks that teach engineering, calculus, and physics by exploring the relationships between the three subjects. Arts, humanities, and social sciences courses take an interdisciplinary approach to subjects such as the "self" ("What is I?"), history ("History of Technology"), and art ("Wired Ensemble" and "Seeing and Hearing").

Olin College maintains a strong emphasis on practically grounded education, teaching not only the concepts but also connecting them to real-world challenges and projects. Beginning their first year, students receive training in Olin's machine shop for project based work. First-year students all take "Design Nature", a class that teaches design tools and processes. In this class, students design and build mechanical toys based on biological systems (such as the click beetle's jumping mechanism). Projects often take a "do-learn" approach, with the application of concepts being taught before the formal introduction of the underlying theory.

Olin's Curriculum expires every five years, and must undergo an internal curriculum review. The goal of these reviews is to ensure that the college maintains a culture of change and continuous improvement, and constantly working to reinvent itself. The first of these reviews is in progress as of December 2006. It is not yet clear to what extent the curriculum review will result in changes, but significant aspects of the curriculum are being considered for detailed review. Notably projects, student assessment, AHS/E! course offerings, experimentation within Olin, student workload are being targeted specifically for detailed review. These areas of detailed review where selected after significant student and faculty feedback was solicited from the Olin community.

Accreditation

Olin College has received accreditation from New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC). The college only recently became eligible for accreditation after it graduated its first class on Sunday, May 21, 2006. Olin is also working with the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET), which accredits specific engineering degree programs. If granted, accreditation will apply retroactively to degrees issued by the college. Olin College has had trouble attracting and keeping international students, due to students' difficulty in obtaining student visas for an unaccredited institution. However, a handful of international students are currently enrolled.

Culture

Residential life

The Academic Center at night.

Most students at Olin College have chosen to live on campus in the dormitories. As a result, much of the social life at Olin occurs in the lounges on each floor of the residence halls. Olin has no fraternities and sororities, nor does it plan to introduce them. Olin College does not regulate the dormitories, except where required by law or for the safety of the college.

Social conflicts are generally resolved informally; students approach the Honor Board with a conflict only in extreme cases. In addition, the Office of Student Life picks student Resident Resources (R2s) to fill the role traditionally filled by the Resident Assistants (RAs) at other schools. Unlike most RAs, R2s are not directly responsible for enforcing college dorm policies.

Honor Code

The Olin Partners created an Honor Code in 2002. The Olin Honor Code has six clauses: Integrity, Respect for Others, Passion for the Welfare of the College, Patience and Understanding, Openness to Change, and Do Something. The first five clauses are based on the college's Core Values as defined in its founding precepts. The sixth clause calls on students to take action when they feel that the Honor Code has been violated, either through official or unofficial means. Students sign the Honor Code as they begin their first year of courses.

An elected Honor Board enforces the Honor Code, mediating conflicts and applying sanctions where necessary. The Code and its related policies can be amended by a majority of students at a "town meeting" of at least half of the student body.

Each "amendment town meeting" concludes with a vote on whether to abolish the Honor Code. If the code were abolished, the governing policies set up by the Office of Student Life would take effect. This automatic vote prevents the Code from remaining in effect if students no longer support it.

Extracurricular activities

Students can participate in multiple extra-curricular school activities. These include student clubs, community service projects, co-curricular activities with faculty and staff (which are noted on the transcript), and "Passionate Pursuits"—independent projects eligible for funding and/or non-degree credit.

Olin students are also involved in writing, visual arts, music, and theater. Olin College has a variety of clubs and organizations that support the arts, including the Olin Vocal Ensemble, the Franklin W. Olin Players (FWOP), Film Club, and the Olin Conductorless Orchestra.

Athletics play a limited role at Olin College. Local intercollegiate sports leagues such as NEWMAC have been unwilling to accept Olin College as a full member. Olin has no intercollegiate athletic teams, but has an intramural soccer league. In addition, Olin students are allowed to participate in club teams and in non-NCAA sports at Babson College. The Babson women's rugby team (currently ranked first on the East Coast for Div. III, and moving up to Div. II in the 2006 season) includes several Olin members. Additionally, students participate in Sunday morning football games, pick-up and intramural Ultimate games, the Student Martial Arts Club (SMAC), the Weapons Handling and Combat Kakistocracy (WHACK) (Olin's fencing club), and other athletic organizations.

Any group of four or more students may form a club and apply for funding. Clubs on campus belong to the Caucus of Clubs and Organizations (CCO). Student clubs also fall under the oversight of the Council of Olin Representatives (CORe), Olin's student government.

Olin students are also encouraged to combine their creative and technical skills in competitions. Every year, students have competed in the Mathematical Contest in Modeling (MCM). In 2002, a team from Olin College received the highest rating possible in the MCM; in 2005 an Olin team received the highest rating and earned the INFORMS Prize. Some students compete in design projects for organizations such as the Society of Automotive Engineers' Mini-Baja competition and the Olin Automatons, a group interested in autonomous vehicle technology (originally pursuing the development of an autonomous vehicle for the DARPA Grand Challenge).

Spontaneity and student happiness

At Olin College, organized events are often arranged on a spontaneous basis. This is in part due to Olin's small size and in part due to the popular use of email lists in the Olin community. Olin College has over 180 public mailing lists, notable because Olin is a school of only 300 students. To some degree, this sort of communication is only possible because of the high level of trust placed in the student body. For example, Olin allows any student to send email to all students or all faculty without any sort of permission or moderation.

Organized "Study Breaks", fun activities run by R2s, student organizations, or informal groups of students, help students cope with high stress levels caused by work and disparate responsibilities. The Student Activities Committee (SAC), part of Olin College's student government, funds and organizes recreational events. Many events that are organized outside of the SAC by students also receive SAC funding.

Rankings

The Princeton Review ranked Olin as #11 on its "list of schools with happy students" for 2004 . It was the only engineering college on the list.

In 2005 the Princeton Review ranked Olin even higher in various categories, ranking Olin as #1 on the "Quality of Life" list. The students' happiness is surely fed in part by the high quality of food and dorms at Olin; Princeton Review's Best 361 Colleges also lists Olin as #2 on the "Best Campus Food" list and #2 on the "Dorms Like Palaces" list.

In 2006, Olin was selected for Kaplan/Newsweek's 2007 Guide as one of America's 25 New Elite "Ivies"

In 2007, Olin moved up to #9 on the Princeton Review's "Happiest Students" list .

Mascot

In 2002, the Olin Partners and Virtual Olin Partners selected the phoenix as the school's mascot. This mascot, sometimes unofficially called "Frank", represents Olin's willingness to reinvent itself, just as the phoenix is reborn from its ashes. Olin College's school colors are blue and silver.

References

• Murray, Charles (August 30, 2004). "If I'm happy, can this be EE school?" EE Times.
• Wessel, David (December 20, 2005). "Building a Better Engineer" Wall Street Journal.
• Guizzo, Erico (May, 2006). "The Olin Experiment: Can a tiny new college reinvent engineering education?," IEEE Spectrum.

External links

• Olin College Website
• History of Olin College
• Frankly Speaking (Olin College's student newspaper)
• Olin College Honor Code
• Olin College faculty
• Princeton Review - Olin College
• Princeton Review - Olin College (PDF)