1. Welcome to Mechanical Engineering at RIT
Welcome to mechanical engineering at RIT. It is indeed a pleasure to have you join our community – a close knit group of individuals from across the United States, and around the globe. We look forward to getting to know you very well over the next five years, and we view this as simply the first step in a relationship that we hope will last a lifetime.
I would like to spend some time with you this morning, to share some recent success that members of our community have enjoyed, and encourage you to take part in the many varied programs and activities that our department offers. I will also identify some hurdles and challenges that you may expect to face during this first year here at RIT. I will close with some words of guidance and a challenge to excel before dismissing you to work closely with your faculty advisors for the balance of the morning.
Dr. Edward Hensel, PE
Professor and Department Head
Mechanical Engineering …
We Design The Future

2. Why are we here?
Our Mission is to prepare students for careers in industry or for graduate study in engineering or related fields.
Obtaining a degree in mechanical engineering is not an easy task, it will take a good deal of hard work, dedication, and perseverance on the part of each and every one of you. However, completing your degree will provide you with untold benefits, and opportunities for fulfillment and success along the path. Completing your degree is not something that you will do alone. We have a team of highly skilled faculty and staff to guide you through the process of growing into a mechanical engineer.
Your peers, the members of your learning community, the professors you work with in the classroom, your faculty advisor, and staff from across campus are all working on a team to help you become a mechanical engineer. We expect you to help one another to learn the materials, and to become masters of the subject matter. I expect each and every one of you to be individually competent in the skills taught in the classroom and in your text books, and to demonstrate the utmost of professional ethics and integrity throughout your time at RIT.
Our curriculum emphasizes the fundamentals and will provide you with courses that allow you to specialize in your chosen fields of study. To help ready you for life in the larger community, we seek to maintain a balance among humanistic-social subjects, the physical sciences, and engineering studies.
“Well done is better than well said.” … Benjamin Franklin

3. Formula – On A Roll!
RIT's Formula SAE racing team placed fifth overall among 64 teams from 13 countries in the Formula SAE European competition, held in August in Germany. The team took first place in skid pad, 4th in endurance, 11th in design, 14th in autocross, and 16th in acceleration.
Many of you have already enjoyed the thrill of participating as a member of an award-winning sports team, or musical group. Endeavors such as these require individuals with a variety of skills to come together, to apply their own skills in a highly effective, and ethical manner, and to coordinate their actions with other members of the team. Our competition teams and clubs provide you with a similar opportunity, with the added twist of giving you an opportunity apply the technical skills you learn in the classroom and laboratory to an open ended design problem.
I hope that you will augment your formal educational experience here at RIT through participation in one of our many innovative clubs, sports, or co-curricular activities, for those activities provide the events upon which you will look back with fond memories 25 years from now. Through activities like our ASME, Aero Design Club, Micro Air Vehicle Team, Super Mileage Club, Formula Team, Human Powered Vehicle Team, METEOR Team, and FIRST robotics clubs you will have an opportunity to learn from upper classmen, share your experience and knowledge, and forge friendships that will last a lifetime.

4. Mechanical Engineering Good Things are Happening!
Great Students and Organizations!
Great Faculty and Staff!
38,000 square foot expansion to Building 9 will be dedicated in a grand opening on September 7th!
World Class First Year Retention!
We only admit students whom we believe can be successful in our program.
We have a great group of staff and faculty in the ME department, and they are all focused on helping you be successful in your studies and career preparation. Your class has a group of outstanding faculty advisors. Drs. Ghosh, Gupta, Kempski, Lamkin-Kennard, and Varela will serve as your academic advisors for the next five years. They will move through the curriculum with you, and assist you in planning your academic career, as well as getting started in your first professional co-op experiences just a couple of years from now.
Retention in mechanical engineering has been a focal point for the improvement of our department for the past several years, and we have seen wonderful progress. When I was a young man, entering college, as you are today, I remember going to my first physics lecture. The lecture was in a large hall of 350 students. My professor invited each one of us to look to our left, and look to our right, and introduce ourselves. We did so, and exchanged greetings. After a moment or two, he redirected our attention to the front of the room, and kindly informed us, that by the end of the year one of the two people we had just met would likely not be here any longer. I believe that is wrong. When we admit students to mechanical engineering at RIT, we admit you with the expectation that every single one of you has the ability to be successful in our program. Ultimately, your success in this program depends upon you – BUT – you are not alone in your pursuit of your degree.

5. ME Admit One Year Retention History
Enter Fall
# Entering
# still at RIT
# still in ME
% still at RIT
% still in ME
1995 94 79 65
84%
69%
1996 90 75 64
83%
71%
1997 82 62 55
76%
67%
1998
109 89 67
82%
61%
1999
134
116
86%
2000
147
127
111
2001
139
120
102
73%
2002
115
110 88
96%
77%
2003
122
87%
2004
128
113
95%
88%
Let’s take a look at how things have changed in the past decade. A decade ago, about 2/3 of all students who applied to the mechanical engineering department at RIT were offered admission. This year, you represent less than 1/10th of the over 1,400 applicants to our program. One decade ago, approximately 1/3 of our freshman class would no longer be in mechanical engineering one year later. I would like to ask you to start over here, at the left side of the room, and ask every third person to stand up. Go ahead, let’s have every third person stand up. Please, take a look around the room. One decade ago, the number of people standing reflects how many people would be gone from our program within the first year. Now, please take a seat. Over here, in the front of the room, let me ask these seven people to stand. One year from today, this will represent the upper bound on how many students will have left our department. This is remarkable progress. Please, take a seat.
As little as two decades ago, the majority of the graduates of the RIT mechanical engineering department took positions in industry – primarily as members of engineering organizations within large multi-national corporations (and household names) such as Kodak, Xerox, Bausch and Lomb, and General Motors (and its automotive component group, subsequently spun off as a stand-alone company, Delphi). Without a doubt, our graduates also went to work for many other companies across the country, and around the world. Most of our graduates worked in manufacturing support or product and process engineering, and took on specialized positions within their companies.
Today, our graduates face a dramatically different landscape. I would be hard-pressed to identify a small group of companies that dominates in hiring 80% of our graduates. Our graduates work in small companies, in large companies, in New York, throughout the USA, and around the world. Our graduates today routinely take positions in manufacturing, product design and development, R&D, systems engineering, technical sales and support, the service sector, the public sector, financial services industry, medical technologies and medicine, energy systems, automotive industries, and aerospace industries. Our graduates are equally as likely to work in a firm having fewer than perhaps 100 employees as they are to work in a firm having more than 5,000 employees.
During the 1990’s: one year retention at RIT hovered around 82%,
while one year retention within the ME program was around 67%,

6. RIT Co-op and Career Services
"Toyota's experience with RIT has been wonderful. The relationships we have built with career services and the engineering departments are not only better than any other, but are beyond our expectations. RIT has become the number 1 source of college co-ops and new grads for Toyota Engineering & Manufacturing North America."
… Kim Demkco, Toyota North America
RIT and the Mechanical Engineering Department have established numerous relationships with employers, that will provide benefit to you, and to our mutual success. Our automotive option has formed strategic partnerships with General Motors Corporation and Toyota Engineering and Manufacturing. Our Aerospace option has on-going relationships with the Boeing corporation, and Parker Hannifin, and emerging relationships with Moog Aerospace. Our Energy and Environment Option is strategically aligned with the Dresser Rand Corporation – a global leader in the energy services industry. As a matter of fact, in October, Dresser Rand has invited our entire first year class to visit their manufacturing facility in Olean NY. That visit will form a central theme of our first year enrichment program this year – and illustrate fully the roles that our mechanical engineering graduates play in the global energy needs of our society. As we move forward into the 21st century, it will be increasingly important for you to become aware of the global marketplace and society within which you practice your profession.
As a graduating engineer, you will face global competition for your job. You will literally compete for work with an individual half-way around the world. You will have a more difficult time of maintaining your standard of living and quality of life than I have, than my parents did, and than my grandparents did. The 20th century represented the first time in human history that a young adult could learn a career, skill, or trade in their teens, and have that skill-set become obsolete prior to the end of their working lifetime. You must be able to stay current with technology, and customize your educational program here at RIT to meet your educational needs for entering the early part of your career. RIT, the Kate Gleason College of Engineering, and the ME Department remain committed to career oriented education, as we have for over 175 years. However, we must recognize that the careers you will embark upon are fundamentally different and more varied than in decades past.

7. Expectations Team Learning Individual Competence
Dedication and Perseverance
Increased focus on critical thinking skills
Focus on basics of algebra, trigonometry, vectors, and units – an area we have seen decline in recent years.
The ME department at RIT is a nationally recognized program, and we are getting stronger every year. In August 2006, the American Society for Engineering Education released its annual “By the Numbers” report, which ranks the production of BS graduates in various engineering disciplines. For the academic year (the most recent published data available), the RIT ME department was the 16th largest producer of BSME graduates of all ME departments in the USA.
Our graduates need to be prepared to shift focus and career skills several times over the course of their career, and be prepared with a higher level of analytical and critical thinking skills than ever before. We need to enhance our students’ quality of depth of thought, while preserving strong “tool skills.” NOW is the time to take our program to the next level. Our first year programs are strong. Our student body is stronger than ever, our retention is higher than ever, our levels of scholarship are higher than ever. Our upper division and graduate programs are demanding more from the core curriculum. It is now time to focus on the core of the mechanical engineering discipline – to strengthen our program, and to adjust it so that our students are even more well-prepared as they enter their final years of undergraduate study and their career. Our students, faculty, and staff are ready for the challenge of increasing the level of academic expectations in our program. During the next several years, our program will placed increased emphasis on critical thinking and innovative problem solving skills; while maintaining the highest standards of integrity, and demonstrating individual competence.

8. Commitment Team commitments. Individual commitments.
We are here to help you. Let us.
Help one another; take responsibility for one another.
Individual commitments.
Demonstrate individual competence in your areas of study.
Do not abuse one another.
This is the first step of a long journey. Over the next five years, you will grow in many ways, and we will grow along side you. I look forward to having my life be enriched through my interactions with you, and hope that I too may be able to touch your lives. Please, look to the persons seated nearby you – to your left, your right, in front, and in back. Tack a moment to introduce yourselves if you have not already done so. Make sure that YOU know the names of at least four other first year mechanical engineering students. This week, you will come to know nearly 30 of your peers. My request is straight-forward, but it is by no means simple.
I ask you to help these people. Help them learn. Ask them to help you learn. Do not simply let them copy your homework. Engage them, so that they can complete the work themselves. Refuse offers from them that would diminish your own skills, but embrace their offers to expand your understanding of the subject matter. If your friend cuts class, call them on it. They are detracting from our team’s goal. Wake them up, pester them to get to every 8 am class. You must go to class. Every class. Every day.
You have a long career ahead of you. These next five years are an investment of your most valuable resource – YOUR TIME. Use this investment wisely.
"Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe."  -- Abraham Lincoln,

9. Class of 2012
Group Photo
Now, I would like to ask all of you to come to the front of the room, so that we may take the first group picture of the RIT Mechanical Engineering Class of After the portrait, we will re-seat you by your newly established learning communities, for the duration of the sessions today.

10. Go to Room 1129 Argabright, Kevin Borella, Brittany Caton, William
Cheney, Michael
English, Chad
Garland, Andrew
Guerra, Christopher
Herbert, Jeffrey
Kane, Melissa
Komendat, Andrew
Lentlie, William
Marcello, John
McGuirk, Marissa
Phillips, Samantha
Purak, Amina
Rimkus, Sigitas
Scanlon, John
Seaman, Jonathan
See, Evan
Sharaf, Joshua
Sonneborn, David
Spath, Timothy
Sullivan, Christopher R
Swartz, Robert
Switzer, Matthew
Thazathu, Bharat
Tobin, Daniel
Van Slyke, Justin
Yan, Rambert
Zelinger, Franklin
If you see your name on this list, please take a seat in the indicated area of the auditorium.
Go to Room 1129

11. Go to Room 1129 Aderman, Erik Bender, Ryan Burns, John Ceron, Frances
Crosby, Edward
Day, Derek
Dunckley, Kyle
Grant-Diaz, Kira
Greene, Penn
Hinton, Shane
Hugues-Simmons, Peter
Le Clerc, Donald
Marion, Matthew
McMahon, Robert
Phan, Dawn
Phillips, Amanda
Samowitz, Bryan
Santini, David
Schmidt, Colin
Sieczkarek, Aaron
Smith, Christina
Snell, Nicholas
Stephenson-Vallot, Brian
Sullivan, Christopher C
Topper, Derek
Go to Room 1129

12. Go to Room 1149 Berger, Michael Birkel, Andrew Blachowicz, Michael
Blair, Andrew
Bressler, Iric
Cangero, Ian
Dodge, Jared
Godshalk, Bradley
Han, Sangil
Hatch, Cody
Hergott, Braden
Holleran, John
Jones, Christopher
Kasemer, Matthew
Mina, Nathaniel
Norris, Ryan
Owens, Matthew
Pederson, Todd
Prabhu, Pranav
Radziewicz, Thomas
Rodriguez, Diana
Samari, Pourya
Sciarrino, Marc
Scionti, Michael
Shea, John
St Pierre, Joseph
Wisinski, Joseph
Go to Room 1149

13. Go to Room 1159 Accas, Owen Anderson, Cody Bagley, Stephen
Bajorski, Krzysztof
Bastian, Geoffrey
Cerankosky, Katelyn
Gagnon, Andrew
Gajewski, Steven
Hagerty, Peter
Hartman, Carl
Hurley, Ryan
Hussain, Heather
Huynh, Samantha
Keel, Allen Tison III
Kim, Sang Youn
Morgenstern, David
Myers, Michael
Polimeni, Michael
Powell, Matthew
Quakenbush, Justin
Rukas, Christopher
Schindler, Jeffrey
Schmidt, David
Sukha, Davendra
Torres, Chris
Trenk, Matthew
Wallace, Timothy
Wheaton, Jay
Wozniak, Evan
Go to Room 1159

14. Go to Room 2129 Ahlin, Konrad Baker, Thomas Bourque, Molly
Davidson, Benjamin
Dougherty, Tara
Ehrenzeller, John
Frasch, Graham
Hall, Richard
Hattori, Taylor
Hemink, Douglas
Holmes, Bernard
Holmstrom, Rachel
Hugunine, Adam
Josselyn, Tyler
Kernan, David
Landers, Cody
Lazeski, Philip
Marsillo, Michael
O’Dell, Brittanie
Rankie, Mitchell
Ryan, Patrick
Safford, Kevin
Scozzari, Giovanni
Stam, Simon
Stratton, Kurt
Svrchek, Olivia
Tierney, William
Traxler, Shauna
Wong, Anson
Go to Room 2129

15. Barry Robinson
Learning Communities
Services
Building for Success

16. Hensel’s Fall LC Challenge to the ME Class of 2012
I challenge each of your learning communities to excel academically during your first quarter on campus.
The Learning Community with achieving the greatest percentage of A, B, and C grades relative to credits enrolled for as of drop day wins the challenge.
The winning learning community can pick their own prize, with a value up to $1,000.
We will measure our performance by the cohort of students admitted into Mechanical Engineering Learning Communities as of today, and course completion statistics for the Fall Quarter,

17. Dismissal
By Learning Communities