When Christine Ortiz, a former dean of the graduate school at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, last spoke with The Chronicle, she shared big plans for creating “the university of the future.” She said it would forgo many college mainstays, like traditional classes and academic departments.
Ms. Ortiz still has her lofty dreams and a tenured professorship in materials science and engineering at MIT, but now, she says, she also has a founding team, start-up funds, and a name for the enterprise: Station1.
Registered as a nonprofit organization in Massachusetts, it won’t apply for accreditation for at least three to four years, she says. That time will be spent developing programs for the eventual curriculum and establishing a sustainable financial model.
Fresh off starting Station1’s website, the first public face of her idea, Ms. Ortiz shared details with The Chronicle of the team’s progress and what’s to come.
Donations are paying for one development employee and a soon-to-be-hired program director (applications open). Ms. Ortiz wouldn’t say how much has been raised, but a list of donors is on the website.
Station1’s address is listed simply as “Lawrence, Massachusetts,” because office space hasn’t yet been leased.
A summer fellowship program has been announced for 2018, but housing and the number of fellows have yet to be determined. The application portal promises to provide a stipend and to cover living expenses for the residential program to selected undergraduates. The description of the summer program describes it as a mix of internships, STEM training, and passion projects.
Location and Curriculum
Ms. Ortiz and her team have been scouting spaces in Lawrence appropriate to the project-based learning they hope to foster.
“We looked at a lot of cities in Massachusetts, and Lawrence really jumps out at us,” Ms. Ortiz said. “It has a really amazing community — diverse, multicultural, very high immigrant population, and just really an amazing community. It’s a burgeoning ecosystem that is in the Boston region, but not in Cambridge or Boston.”
The Merrimack River, which runs through Lawrence, is lined with former mills and other industrial buildings. Such spaces, she said, would lend themselves to the vision the team has for Station1’s first space.
The programs are being planned to align with the envisioned college’s principles: a dedication to science- and technology-rich learning, multidisciplinary studies, and education that is equitable for students of diverse backgrounds.
As a professor and administrator at MIT, Ms. Ortiz said, she saw problems so ingrained in traditional academic institutions that she felt compelled to create something new. Freed from those “constraints,” she said, she can participate in creating a new version of postsecondary STEM education.
The team includes Ellan Spero, a fiber scientist and historian, and Elliot Mandel, an entrepreneur. They have studied hundreds of existing models from around the world and read relevant research, Ms. Ortiz said.
“The strands were all there as aspirations in the beginning,” she said. “This has evolved all throughout because of this diverse team.”
