Utsav Gandhi
CAMPUS EDITOR

“Today is my second best day as
President of the university. The first was when
the Fueling Innovation campaign was made
public, and today, we are announcing a land-
mark challenge gift towards the same goal. If
someone were to ask me a few days ago, ‘what
if someone gave you 10 million dollars, I’d
probably just ask again—really?” said, Iohn L.
Anderson, the President of Illinois Institute of
Technology. '

Friday, February 28, was a break-
through occasion for the course of history this
university is charting.

President Anderson welcomed some
members of the Board of Trustees, university
administration, staff and faculty, student rep-
resentatives from the Leadership Academy and
the Student Government Association as well as

many other weal-”fishers of “the university in

the Atrium of Tech Park; even as some stu-
dents were religiously pursuing class projects
in the Idea Shop next door.

The occasion was to announce a
twelve—month, ten million-dollar challenge gift
towards the university’s planned Innovation
Center, by alumnus Ed Kaplan (MMAE, ’65).
Emphasizing the fact that 1968 was the last
time an academic building was constructed
on the IIT main campus; the President spoke
about the importance of the 100,000 square
foot space that is expected to house the IIT In—
stitute of Design, IIT’s flagship IPRO program,
the Idea Shop and the Leadership Academy,
among other offices. Practitioners from the
Chicagoland will be available to mentor stu-

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Student newspaper of the Illinois Institute of Technology since 1928

Innovation Center receives

dents to “learn, create and innovate,” which
will transform the way IIT interacts with the
community.

It will encourage students to think
big and work on interdisciplinary team proj-
ects for some valuable experiential learning.

Dane Christianson (MMAE, pro-
posed graduation 2015) inventor of the X-
Cube, was a fitting choice to introduce the il-
lustrious alum. making this landmark gift, Ed
Kaplan.

Both are mechanical engineers, from
Chicago, became entrepreneurs in their early
205, and are graduating exactly 50 years apart.

 

Christianson talked about how Kaplan was be-
hind the development of barcode technologies
in 1969 (“Zebra technology”) which revolu-
tionized the way we did business. Christian-
son also mentioned how he got to combine his
entrepreneurial bug with his love for robotics
at the Idea Shop, which is now slowly outgrow—
ing itself (“from what used to be an empty Idea
Shop three years ago to everyone getting ideas
now”)—making the announcement of the gift
all the more relevant. The “Ed Kaplan Family
Institute for Innovation and Technology Entre-
preneurship” was then unveiled with a custom
made X—Cube handed over from Christianson

technewsiit.com

OPINION 2
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landmarkmatching donation

to Kaplan, whose wife, Carol was not able to
be present but personally acknowledged by
Christianson himself.

Kaplan spoke about his discussions
with his good friends, Regent Craig Duchos~
sois and campaign co-chair John Rowe, which
impressed upon him the importance of the
building they would have. Enhancing the
unique skill sets of the students, it would in—
crease their value in the competitive market—
place, making students “flock” to IIT to pur—
sue a variety of career paths. It will stimulate
design thinking and methodology across the
board of educational levels at IIT, allow more
IPRO classes to solve problems, encourage the
development of new things and ways of think-
ing, firmly establishing IIT as the center for
technical innovation among Chicago’s “tech
ecosystem.”

The vision is here, the plan is here,
the window of opportunity is open—so IIT
must act now to move into a leadership po-
sition. He stressed on the importance of the
nexus between engineering, technology and
business — and how this center will place IIT
on the map of technology innovation and en—
trepreneurship. With that, he announced that
if within the next twelve months the university
will be able to fundraise ten million dollars to-
wards the Innovation Center, he would match
that gift, bringing the project goal to almost 75
percent of the target.

“If you can’t feel good today, you
probably can never feel good,” President An—
derson remarked.

To read more about the Fueling In-
novation Campaign, visit httpszl/fuelinginno-
vation.iit.edu/.

 

Photos by Michael 6035 Phowgraphy, courtesy of II T