Engineering Degree Trends for African American Women and Men

Keith J. Bowman became Professor and Chair of the Department of Mechanical, Materials and Aerospace Engineering at Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) in August, 2011, immediately following nearly five years of experience leading the Purdue School of Materials Engineering as Interim Head and Head. His first faculty appointment was as an Assistant Professor at Purdue University in 1988 after receiving degrees from Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), (B.S. 1981, M.S. 1983) and the University of Michigan (Ph.D. 1987). He was promoted to Associate Professor in 1992, and then promoted to Professor in 1996. Keith Bowman served as a visiting professor and received Alexander von Humboldt stipends for research at the Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany in 1996 and again in 2002. He served as a visiting professor at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia in 2003. From 1996 to 2004 he served as graduate program chair of the Purdue School of Materials Engineering (MSE) during a substantial retooling of the program to more strongly emphasize doctoral degrees. In 2005-06 he served a one-year appointment as Interim Head of MSE and in 2007 was named Head of the Purdue School of Materials Engineering (MSE). He was named a Fellow of the American Ceramic Society in 2000, and has held several division and society positions, including becoming a member of the Board of Directors in 2012. In ASME, known as the American Society of Mechanical Engineers, he is a member of the executive committee of the mechanical engineering department heads and chairs (MEDHC). Awards at Purdue University include receiving the MSE Best Teaching Award in 1992 and 1995 and Purdue’s highest teaching award, the Charles Murphy Undergraduate Teaching Award in 1995. In 2003 Professor Bowman’s name was added to the Purdue Book of Great Teachers. In 2007 he received the Purdue College of Engineering Mentoring Award and he became a Professor of Engineering Education (by courtesy). In 2012 he was invested as the first Duchossois Leadership Professor in the IIT Armour College of Engineering.