Dear Carl,
Thank you for your response and for re-iterating the School’s loan mechanism. While I understand the concept of aligning travel with externally funded research, I believe that the requirement to provide a proposal describing how
the travel support fits into a plan for external funding is premature and not well justified when PIN faculty still need more time to adjust and “rebuilt” their research program after the disruptions that happened during this transition.
In fact, Indy faculty have lost $1,500 in yearly travel budget on which they relied to ensure a continued conference participation even during a time when no research funding was available to cover this critical activity.
Just to give you a feel of the kind of disruption that resulted from the re-alignment, I would like to refer to my case. Two of my research initiatives IPLI (Initiative for Product Lifecycle Innovation) and CAMRI (Collaborative
Additive Manufacturing Research) were disrupted. Also, I lost my research lab which hosted IPLI as well as advanced manufacturing resources. Partnerships with Industry (e.g. Siemens) which were built over many years were disrupted/ended. In addition, all part-time
PhD students (3 in total) under my supervision were given a deadline to graduate or risk dismissal. On the other hand, I have to rebuilt my teaching portfolio in order to start teaching undergraduate courses from Purdue-WL plan of study as well as develop
new graduate courses because my courses were not approved due to overlap with existing Purdue-WL courses. As you can see, the complete portfolio has been disrupted and needs to be rebuilt. It is like starting as a new tenure-track faculty needing a startup
package!
For those of us working actively to establish new collaborations, develop research directions, and build competitiveness for external funding during this transition, travel is precisely the mechanism needed to reach that point.
To require a detailed funding plan, given the above mentioned disruptions, before access to such opportunities is granted creates a structural “catch-22” that disproportionately disadvantages faculty without current grants, in particularly, PIN faculty
who were adversely affected by the re-alignment.
The risk is that this system inadvertently privileges faculty who already hold external awards while excluding those who most need support to get back on track. This undermines the School’s broader goal of expanding research capacity
at the Indy campus of Purdue. A modest, School-supported travel allocation—at least on a transitional basis—would ensure that all faculty can access the professional networks and collaborations that lead to funded research.
Best,
___________________________________________
Dr. Hazim El-Mounayri | Associate Prof. of Mechanical Engineering
Purdue University Indianapolis | 723 W Michigan St. SL 260
Indianapolis IN 46202 USA | 765-495-7751 (O)
317-490-6079 (M)
___________________________________________
From: Carl R Wassgren <wassgren@purdue.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, August 19, 2025 11:44 AM
To: Hazim Atef El Mounayri <helmouna@purdue.edu>; me-indy-faculty@ecn.purdue.edu; me-indy-staff@ecn.purdue.edu
Cc: Hazim Atef El Mounayri <helmouna@purdue.edu>; Eckhard A Groll <groll@purdue.edu>
Subject: Re: Welcome and ...
The School can provide a loan to support conference travel; however, this loan must be paid back, via AY release time for example. In addition, the travel request should be accompanied by a short proposal describing
how the travel support fits into the requestor's plan for obtaining externally funded research.
Another option for faculty to consider for temporary research support is the Purdue Research Bridge Program: https://www.purdue.edu/research/oevprp/funding-and-grant-writing/bridge-program.php
Note that the Eligibility section for this funding states that faculty must have, "... an established record of externally funded research programs ..." and "... applicants must have expended all unrestricted start-up and discretionary funds."
For potential graduate student travel funding outside of the School, please refer to:
Hi Carl,
Thank you for the update.
I agree with you regarding the use of conferences as a vehicle for pursuing industrial research partnerships. However, as you might know, Indy faculty used to have a travel
budget from the department which was critical for some of the members to cover (part of the cost) to attend and present at their most relevant technical conferences. This was taken away during this transition leaving faculty who don’t have research funding
allocated for travel at a “research” disadvantage. On the other hand, PhD students who have not passed their prelim exam yet can apply for a $700 funding to attend a conference but they have to cover their expenses first and then be reimbursed after the conference
event, which can represent a great financial burden for some of them. My understanding is that PhD students who have completed their prelim are eligible for travel support (at different level).
In view of the above, I would like to request that we consider:
- travel funding for faculty during this transition
- PhD students access to travel support prior to the prelim exam
Best,
___________________________________________
Dr. Hazim El-Mounayri | Associate Prof. of Mechanical Engineering
Purdue University Indianapolis | 723 W Michigan St. SL 260
Indianapolis IN 46202 USA | 765-495-7751 (O)
317-490-6079 (M)
___________________________________________
Welcome back to campus! I hope you’re feeling well rested and excited to start another academic year. I personally always enjoy seeing the energy students have when returning
to campus.
I have a number of items I’d like to share with you before classes start. I apologize for the lengthy email, but I figure it’s best to get all of this in one place so it’s
easy to reference.
- I’d like to welcome several new people to the School:
- Bradley Geswein - Associate Professor of Engineering Practice
- Joe Legan - Instructional Lab Support
- Najmus Saquib - Lecturer for ME
- Charles Schwartz - Lecturer for ME
It’s great to have all of you on board! I’d also like to thank Razi Nalim for his many years of service at IUPUI and Purdue. As many of you know, Razi retired this summer and now holds Professor Emeritus status.
He’s still working with a few graduate students so you may see him around from time to time.
- We’ll continue several activities this fall that we initiated last spring:
- Monthly ME-Indy Faculty and Staff Meetings (it’s not just for professors). Zach has sent out an Outlook Calendar invite with the timing and room location(s).
Unfortunately, the originally scheduled time will need to change as my teaching assignment changed yesterday. We'll automatically update the time and location once my schedule is settled. Of course you’re not required to attend these meetings, but I do find
it helpful getting your feedback so I can help make positive changes.
- Monthly Free Food Fridays. This event is primarily for the students, but faculty and staff are encouraged to stop by for a small snack and a quick chat with students.
Zach has sent an Outlook Calendar invite for these as well just so you know when and where they’ll be.
- Monthly Pizza with a Professor. The student attendance at these was poor last semester, but we’re hoping it will pick up this semester with improved advertising.
We’re looking for a few volunteers to spend an informal 50 minutes having pizza with the students. Please contact Zach if you’re interested and available.
- Weekly Associate Head office hour. This semester my office hour will be on Mondays from 2:00 - 2:50 PM in SL 260R. Anyone is free to stop by to chat. Last semester
I had a surprising number of students stop in to ask questions about the School and future planning.
-
- Last year was filled with many changes and if you’re like me, you find it difficult to keep track of the various departmental policies. Fortunately, most of these
are available on the ME Intranet site: https://engineering.purdue.edu/Intranet/Groups/Schools/ME
In particular, I often refer to the “School Policies” link on the right-hand side under the “School Resources” heading. I encourage you to poke around this intranet site to see what’s there.
-
- We’ll have our six-year ABET review of the ME and MSPE programs this fall and there will be a site visit to the Indianapolis campus on Sa, Sep 27. I don’t have
all the details yet, but I expect we’ll be providing tours of our instructional facilities and interviews with a few faculty. I’ll let you know more when I know more. It’s not the most exciting reading, but I also encourage you to look through the ABET Self
Study Report for ME. It describes in detail School and College procedures as well as our performance on a number of educational objectives. Even after more than two decades with Purdue, I still learn new things from these reports. Jitesh Panchal led the
ABET effort and can provide you a PDF copy of the report if you email him.
-
- I think we’ll be seeing more of a push this year for expanding externally supported research at Indianapolis.
- I’ve already contacted a few faculty who will be organizing meetings this fall to explore potential research collaborations across campuses in a few topic areas:
batteries (Likun Zhu and Partha Mukherjee), automotive (Chris Finch and Greg Shaver), and manufacturing (Jing Zhang and Ajay Malshe). These three were chosen initially to get things started since we have teams of people at both campuses with interests in
these areas. Please let me know if you have other topic areas we should explore.
- With the current federal R&D funding climate, I encourage you to consider developing industrial research partnerships in addition to government proposals. My experience
has been that these partnerships often start through conversations at conferences and via referrals from colleagues. You may want to talk to colleagues with similar research interests (like at the meetings I described in the previous bullet point) to get
started.
- As you already know, the School will provide 50% support for a postdoc for new, externally-funded research partnerships involving ME faculty from both campuses.
Again, the idea is to encourage partnerships between campuses.
- The Dean has requested/will be requesting permission to hire five new tenure track faculty specifically for the Indianapolis campus. I’m not sure where things
stand at the moment, but I’ll let you know when I know more.
-
- Another push we’ll be making this fall is re-energizing the student environment. We have several activities in the works.
- Of course we already have a strong Motorsports Club with several sub-organizations. Chris Finch serves as the advisor.
- We will have a new chapter of ASME on campus this fall. Andres Tovar and Xiaoping Du will serve as the advisors.
- VEX U Robotics has a new chapter on campus with ME participation. Andy Tomaschke is serving as the advisor.
- The Official ME Graduate Student Association (OMEGA) will start a new chapter this fall. Wiljones Djoutsop will help to get the chapter started.
- We’re hoping to get the Purdue ME Ambassadors started this fall. Austin McDonald will help coordinate this one.
- Please advertise and encourage students to join these organizations. The most common complaint I heard from students last semester was the lack of community.
These organization will go a long way in helping students feel connected. Research clearly shows that students perform best when they are part of a supportive community.
- We’re going to use ET 010 as a Tutorial Room this fall. The basement area outside this room has a number of large and small tables where students can work on
their own or in small groups when not actively being helped by a TA/instructor. If you’d like to use this ET 010 space for your classes, please let Zach know when you’d like to reserve a table so he can keep track of everything.
- Miscellaneous announcements and reminders:
- There will be a "WelcoME Back!" event held Fr, Aug 29 from 1:00 - 4:00 PM in the ET Atrium. Please stop by to chat with students if you're available. Zach can
give you additional details.
- The SL 260R conference room is now equipped for teleconferencing. Zach can help you with scheduling.
- All graduate students should have financial support either through RAs, TAs, or fellowships. Volunteering in the lab and part-time status are not allowed by the
School.
- UG research can be supported a variety of ways: hourly pay, ME 498xx/499xx (up to 9 cr), SURF (summer), DUIRI, and VIP. For more information, have a look here:
https://engineering.purdue.edu/ME/Undergraduate/ResearchOpportunities
- There is a University policy for interacting with under-18 students. Brandon Boyd will be emailing the faculty and staff about this in the near future.
- The Academic Success Center (ASC) will provide (free) one-on-one tutoring for students enrolled in ME 20000 (WLaf version) and ME 27000 (WLaf version) this semester.
In addition, students can serve as (paid) tutors or request (free) tutors through the ME Tutoring Program. Please refer to the following link for more information:
https://engineering.purdue.edu/ME/Undergraduate/Tutoring