Category: Featured Stories

As Wichita State’s Innovation Campus approaches its 10th anniversary, the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities is recognizing the Innovation Campus’ role in cultivating research and innovation. 

The APLU named Wichita State as one of five finalists for its 11th annual Innovation & Economic Prosperity (IEP) University Awards. 

The College of Engineering has updated one of its programs to create a more strategic career pathway for its graduates and meet the needs of business and industry. Effective fall 2023, the new applied engineering program — formerly engineering technology — has been adapted based on feedback from employers and alumni.  

Applied engineering will be classified by the accreditation authority, ABET, in the general engineering category and move to the new 14.0103 Classification of Instructional Programs (CIP) code, making graduates eligible to pursue their Professional Engineer (PE) licenses in Kansas and elsewhere.

The Accessible Design course concerned Wichita State University junior Reagan Kelley at first. She wasn’t an engineering major and wasn’t sure what she could contribute. 

Conversations with Samantha Corcoran, associate engineering coordinator in the College of Engineering, answered her questions. The payoff at the end of the project made it worthwhile. Kelley, an exercise science major, and three other students modified an all-terrain wheelchair for Sutton, a 9-year-old boy who outgrew the chair’s previous dimensions. 

A new Jersey Mike’s Subs is set to open Wednesday, July 12 in Wichita State University’s Braeburn Square on the Innovation Campus. 

Wichita’s newest Jersey Mike’s franchise location is one of seven dining establishments in the lakeside retail plaza, including Fuzzy’s Taco Shop, Sesame Mediterranean Kitchen, Social Tap, Sungrano Pizza, Wheatly’s Burgers and Two Hands Corn Dogs (opening later this summer).  

The sub shop offers a variety of hot and cold sandwiches, kids’ meals and catering services. The Wichita State franchise location is owned by Annette Hennes and will feature a patio and garage door — a design Hennes says aims to create a comfortable and welcoming space for patrons.

A new Wichita State University initiative is aimed at addressing the critical shortage of educators in special education and elementary classrooms.

The initiative, called Teacher Education Pathways, recently received $97,000 from the Kansas Board of Regents.

The new program — which will start in fall 2023 — will provide smoother pathways for students pursuing Kansas licensure in elementary education and early childhood. WSU will collaborate closely with Butler Community College and WSU Tech to establish a new scholarship and pathway for undergraduates seeking initial teacher licensure.

A group of graduate students from Wichita State University’s Department of History is chronicling the history of the LGBTQ community in Wichita.

The project is the next in a series of photo history books that Dr. Jay Price, chair of history in WSU’s Fairmount College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, has created through Arcadia Publishing. Previous topics of the region’s history include Wichita’s legacy of flight, El Dorado’s oil boom, the Cherokee Strip Land Run, the Lebanese community located in the city and the Mexican Americans of Wichita’s North End.

President Rick Muma and Diane Tinker-Hurst, project manager for Industry and Defense Programs, discussed how Wichita State drives innovation and economic prosperity in an article with the Association of Public & Land-Grant Universities.

They shared how WSU’s vision, mission and values help shape the university’s goal to nurture talented students in a variety of fields; fostering innovation through our initiatives of digital transformation and the development of the MRO program and Molecular Diagnostics Lab; and how the university leads the way with our Innovation Campus.

Walking through campus with Wichita State University First Gentleman Rick Case is like taking a stroll with an anthropomorphized version of the Farmer’s Almanac.

Case — who’s fluent in the care and feeding of flora — points out irises, lilies, hydrangeas, wisteria, ivies and chrysanthemums that thrive both at the President’s Residence on campus and at their private home in Wichita.

Ever the teacher, Case shares growing tips and offers advice about how to maintain the various blooms and nurture new seedlings. And ever the gardener, he stoops down every few yards to pull weeds, pick up bits of trash from the meticulously manicured pathways and steppingstones, or get a closer look at the progress of a particular plant.

The black granite memorial in Piatt Park describes the tragedy of January 1965 and lists the names of those who died in the predominately Black neighborhood.

For Dr. Kevin Harrison, director of diversity, equity and inclusion for the Cohen Honors College, the story of that day is one that deserves more discussion and examination to understand.

Harrison grew up in the Wichita neighborhood around 20th and Piatt Street, less than a mile from campus. The memorial park marks the site where a U.S. Air Force Boeing KC-135 refueling tanker crashed, shortly after takeoff on the morning Jan. 19, 1965. The crash and resulting explosion and fires caused the deaths of 30 people, numerous injuries and the destruction of 10 homes. According to news reports, around 31,000 gallons of jet fuel covered the area with flames and smoke.

Through a new collaboration with McFarland Research and Development, Wichita State University’s National Institute for Aviation Research (NIAR) will expand its burgeoning military fleet sustainment research and development capabilities.  

McFarland R&D, founded by Randy McFarland, will continue in operation. To further leverage McFarland R&D’s existing programs, NIAR will assume its facilities, equipment and operations — which focus on unique airframe repair and replacement strategies, tooling development to support repairs and modifications and depot support — beginning June 1.