Bell Lecture: Tuesday, October 5 in SH 2113

The following information was provided by Dr. Julie Ellis, the head of the WKU Department of Engineering…

Next Tuesday evening , WKU Engineering is having our Bell Lecture for 2010.  The speaker is Dr. Jon Wren, a forensics engineer from Exponent Engineering   (http://www.exponent.com/jon_wren/). They investigate failures related not only to engineering, but medical, environmental, biomechanics, and human tragedies as well. Some of their headline projects include an analysis of the World Trade Center collapse, Oklahoma City bombing, JFK assassination for the American Bar Association, Hurricane Katrina, the Hyatt Regency walkway collapse, the Kemper Arena Failure, and the Exxon Valdez disaster.

We’ll have a reception at 5pm in the main hall of Engineering and Biological Sciences, then go over to Snell 2113 for the presentation at 6:30pm.

Please share this information with your classes and encourage students and other friends of WKU Engineering to attend.  Perhaps give points for attending and thinking about the role of failure in learning.

(Have you read Henry Petroski, To Engineer is Human?  He talks about the high information content of failures.)

We hope to have a good representation of alumni and friends of the WKU Engineering program, but with this very short notice, that will depend heavily on in class announcements and word-of-mouth.  Your help and participation is appreciated.