Message from NJIT President Bloom

Published: Friday, December 13, 2019

NJIT Community Members,

As we complete the Fall 2019 semester, I want to wish our students success on their finals and wish all of you a restful and joyous holiday break. This has been a very productive semester for NJIT, and I want to thank you all for your contributions, particularly the many who have contributed to the development of NJIT’s next strategic plan, NJIT 2025: Building on a Strong Foundation. This plan will guide decision making for the next five years and assure we continue on the upward trajectory that has marked our recent history.

I also want to take this opportunity to highlight some important outcomes and congratulate several individuals who recently have brought distinction to our university. 

During the past several weeks:

  • NJIT was named by The Princeton Review as one of the best schools in the nation for students aspiring to become entrepreneurs. We ranked No. 41 among the Top 50 Undergraduate Schools for Entrepreneurship Studies for 2020 and are the only university in New Jersey to achieve this recognition.
  • NJIT held two ceremonial ribbon cuttings.
    • We celebrated the newly opened NJIT@JerseyCity location, where the Ying Wu College of Computing offers a master’s degree in data science as well as graduate certificates in big data and data mining, with plans to add a graduate certificate in data visualization in spring 2020.
    • We also opened NJIT’s newest research facility, the Microfabrication Innovation Center, where technologists will be able to create nano- and microelectronic sensors and microfluidic devices on campus.
  • On December 12, NJIT hosted more than 350 girls in grades six-10 from Newark’s public schools for the inaugural Newark Public Schools Girls Who Code Showcase. Here is a link to CBS News’ coverage of this outstanding event.
  • NJIT now has a chapter of the Google Developer Student Club. Google formed the international organization two years ago to teach real-world information technology skills and recruit new employees.
  • An NJIT team finished in the top third at this year's regional bracket of the International Collegiate Programming Contest, after competing against teams from 24 colleges that included Columbia, Cornell, Princeton, and Yale, among others.
  • NJIT’s men’s soccer team captured its first Atlantic Sun Conference Championship and earned a spot in the NCAA tournament. The women’ssoccer team knocked off #3 seed Liberty in the conference tournament before falling to #2 seed Lipscomb. And the men’s swimming and diving team was crowned winter ECAC champions.

In addition the following individuals have earned noteworthy accolades:

  • Nirwan Ansari, a distinguished professor of electrical and computer engineering and a pioneer in the field of communications whose research on telecom networks formed part of the backbone for broadband access and later FIOS networks, has been named a 2019 Fellow of the National Academy of Inventors.
  • Howard Kimmel, professor emeritus in chemical engineering, received a Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring. He is one of 15 awardees nationwide and the only recipient in New Jersey this year.
  • Tara Alvarez, a professor of biomedical engineering who studies the links between visual disorders and the brain and develops novel devices to identify and treat them, has been named a fellow of the American Academy of Optometry.
  • Brooke Flammang, assistant professor of biological sciences at NJIT, was named winner of the 2019 Steven Vogel Young Investigator Award by the scientific journal Bioinspiration & Biomimetics.
  • Casey Diekman, associate professor of mathematics, was named a recipient of the prestigious Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program to the United Kingdom in Mathematical Biology.
  • Chrystoff Camacho, an inventor and budding entrepreneur who developed an aerial reforestation device while he was an engineering technology student at NJIT, received a Thomas Alva Edison Patent Award from the Research and Development Council of New Jersey for his drone-deployed seed capsule.

I am continuously impressed by what this university and its community members accomplish. The talent and dedication of the people across NJIT’s campus are remarkable. This has been an outstanding semester, and I look forward to a spring of similar success. Best wishes for happy holidays and a prosperous new year.

 

Sincerely,

Joel S. Bloom

President

New Jersey Institute of Technology