University of Kentucky College of Engineering

University of Kentucky Stanley and Karen Pigman College of Engineering
TypePublic
Established1865; 159 years ago (1865)
DeanRudolph G. Buchheit
Location
Lexington
,
Kentucky
,
USA
Websitewww.engr.uky.edu Edit this at Wikidata
Engineering Quadrangle

The University of Kentucky Stanley and Karen Pigman College of Engineering is an ABET accredited, public engineering school located on the campus of the University of Kentucky. The college has eight departments. The college operates the University of Kentucky College of Engineering Extended Campus at Paducah in partnership with West Kentucky Community and Technical College in Paducah, Kentucky, offering bachelor's degrees in chemical engineering and mechanical engineering.

The college offers nine undergraduate degrees: aerospace engineering, biosystems engineering, chemical engineering, civil engineering, computer engineering, computer science, electrical engineering, materials engineering, mechanical engineering, and mining engineering. It also offers master's and doctoral degrees in biomedical engineering, biosystems engineering, chemical engineering, civil engineering, computer science, electrical engineering, materials engineering, mechanical engineering, and mining engineering. A master's degree in manufacturing systems engineering is available online.

Engineering education at the University of Kentucky goes back to the founding of the university as a Land-grant university in 1865.[1] William Benjamin Munson, the University of Kentucky's first graduate in 1869, studied engineering and became a prosperous entrepreneur. John Wesley Gunn, Class of 1890, earned the first awarded engineering degree. Margaret Ingels earned a mechanical engineering degree in 1916, becoming the first woman to receive an engineering degree from the University of Kentucky College of Engineering. When she later received a master's degree in mechanical engineering, she made history as the first woman in the United States to earn a graduate degree in engineering. The first African-American student to receive an undergraduate degree from the University of Kentucky was Holloway Fields Jr., who graduated with an electrical engineering degree in 1951.[2]

The college currently occupies approximately 320,000 square feet of space. College administration resides in the Ralph G. Anderson Building, which opened in 2002. Thomas W. Lester served as dean from 1990 to 2012, the longest tenure for any dean at the University of Kentucky in its history. In 2018, the college hired Rudolph G. Buchheit from the College of Engineering at Ohio State to serve as dean.

On May 1, 2023, University President Eli Capilouto announced that Stanley Pigman and his wife Karen, would be donating $34.5 million to the college of engineering and would be renamed Stanley and Karen Pigman College of Engineering. [3]

A Major Contribution to the War Effort One of the advancements is the military engineering training students received during World War II. During this time, the College of Engineering added curriculum to specifically support the war effort.[4] The picture to the right is Harley E. Huddle Sr. as he stands next to his wife who is also a notable alumni at the College of Engineering at the University of Kentucky. Mr. Huddle attended the University of Kentucky and was an inventor. He created an engineering business during World War II that automated the cleaning of aluminum cans during the manufacturing process.  Mr. Huddle gives credit for his business success directly to the education he received at the University of Kentucky. For future generations of UK engineering students, Mr. Huddle's family established a scholarship fund providing a way for today's engineering students to benefit from his success.[5] The University of Kentucky College of Engineering provided man advancements to modern day revolutions and technology. An example of this is a research project that includes the impact of environmental conditions on fixed-wing and unmanned aerial systems(UASs). In 2018, the University of Kentucky College of Engineering studied the lower atmospheric impact on unmanned aerial systems. UASs are being tested as potential lower flying options to enable services like drone package delivery. Understanding the atmospheric impact on these aerial systems is an important step to making unmanned aerial systems a reality. All these research projects are clear examples of the long lasting impact the University of Kentucky's College of Engineering had on war efforts.[6]

  1. ^ "Our History". University of Kentucky. Retrieved March 6, 2019.
  2. ^ "Holloway Fields, Jr., BSEE 1951". University of Kentucky College of Engineering. Archived from the original on 22 July 2019. Retrieved 26 March 2021.
  3. ^ "UK Engineering graduate makes history with $34.5 million gift to advance the college, support students". University of Kentucky College of Engineering. Retrieved 3 May 2023.
  4. ^ "Our History | University of Kentucky College of Engineering". www.engr.uky.edu. Retrieved 2021-07-05.
  5. ^ "Passing Down Success". the University of Kentucky. Retrieved 2021-07-05.
  6. ^ Bailey, Sean C. C.; Sama, Michael P.; Canter, Caleb A.; Pampolini, L. Felipe; Lippay, Zachary S.; Schuyler, Travis J.; Hamilton, Jonathan D.; MacPhee, Sean B.; Rowe, Isaac S.; Sanders, Christopher D.; Smith, Virginia G. (2020-08-06). "University of Kentucky measurements of wind, temperature, pressure and humidity in support of LAPSE-RATE using multisite fixed-wing and rotorcraft unmanned aerial systems". Earth System Science Data. 12 (3): 1759–1773. doi:10.5194/essd-12-1759-2020. ISSN 1866-3516.