Long Range Planning

Penn State Department of Aerospace Engineering

Long Range Plan

Our Vision

To work together as a partnership of faculty, staff, students, alumni and advisors, to be recognized as one of the finest aerospace engineering departments in the nation with an international reputation for excellence.

Our Goal

To perform as one of the top ten aerospace engineering departments in research and graduate education, while maintaining a strong commitment to undergraduate education

To realize this vision and achieve our goal, we have established the following

Strategic Goals

To attract and retain the very best researchers and educators on our faculty.

Increase faculty size to support a quality undergraduate experience while expanding our research and graduate activities
Place an emphasis on faculty who are willing to work collaboratively
Strengthen identified thrust areas, while being alert to opportunities and

initiatives in emerging areas.

To further strengthen our undergraduate program.

Maintain and strengthen our commitment to our responsibility for undergraduate education
Increase laboratory, design and project activity
Continue to infuse research advances into the classroom

To establish a closer interaction with industry and alumni in research, practical education and professional service.

To provide an environment in which faculty, staff, and students can do their best work and grow personally and professionally.

The Department of Aerospace Engineering at Penn State can boast a faculty with international reputations in their fields of expertise. Such reputations are usually based on research activities. Yet, the department has traditionally taken on a much higher undergraduate educational responsibility than highly ranked departments in other private and state institutions. We have one of the largest and most satisfied groups of alumni, with 1 out of every 25 aerospace engineers being a Penn State graduate. We recognize that this group represents our greatest contribution to society and we are proud of their achievements. At the same time, to excel in research and graduate education, we must have a critical mass in certain aerospace engineering specialties. Currently these areas of excellence are aeroacoustics, high performance computation, rotorcraft and turbomachinery. We recognize that, over time, these thrust areas could and should change. Closer interactions with alumni and industry are essential. They will provide relevance for our coursework, improved employment opportunities for our graduates, greater involvement of faculty in multidisciplinary research teams addressing problems of national importance, and a growth in our gift funds. Such funds are essential to provide facilities for the best new faculty, cost-sharing to attract funding for external research, and awards that recognize our best students.

Ask our undergraduate and graduate students and alumni. They know that the Department of Aerospace Engineering at Penn State has a commitment to education that is unsurpassed.

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