WWU emphasizes economic development

“Your role has been elevated substantially,” Kastama told Morse. “Entire countries and states are relying on universities to elevate their economies. … You technically are not a research university, but you are looking more and more like one.”

Arlan Norman, dean of WWU’s College of Sciences and Technology, said the university is working hard to address the unmet needs of the state’s economy. Today, Norman said, a shortage of trained technology graduates is acting as a brake on economic growth.

Over the past five years, Norman said, the university has been developing new programs in plastics and composite engineering, neurosciences and molecular biology.

David Patrick, chemistry professor and director of the university’s new Advanced Materials Science and Engineering Center, told Kastama that the center expects to begin offering students a minor degree in the fall, giving them skills in technology that can be used for faster computers, smaller cell phones, lighter cars and planes.

Mark Bussell, another WWU chemistry professor, has been active in the formation of the Northwest Consortium for Technological Innovation and Development that will combine academia, government and the private sector to help promote the technology-based economy.

Bussell told Kastama that the consortium will be an important part of the waterfront campus that WWU expects to build on the redeveloping Bellingham waterfront.

“One of the primary goals of the waterfront campus is to interact with the community,” Bussell said. As Bussell described it, smaller technology firms that participate in the consortium would have access to university labs and researchers that they could not afford to provide for themselves. They could use that research capability to move their innovations into the marketplace.

Ken Oplinger, president and CEO of the Bellingham/Whatcom Chamber of Commerce and Industry, said the state’s high schools should be doing more to provide job skills.

“Not every single student in high school is going to college,” Oplinger said. “We’ve got to put more attention back into getting those students into those skilled jobs.”

But he also urged legislators to consider expanding advanced degree programs at WWU. And he heartily endorsed WWU’s plans for the waterfront.

“This project is far and away the most important thing that’s going to happen in this area in the next 20 years,” Oplinger said. “The business community here is in absolute agreement that this is going to happen, and we’re going to help it happen.”