David Ching, Author

A multidimensional mentor
Once the beneficiary of a mentor’s support, Weldon School head David Umulis now embraces opportunities to encourage his students and faculty in biomedical engineering. David Umulis didn’t plan to speak when he attended the Purdue Board of Trustees’ October 2021 …

Pearl at Purdue: Marion Blalock offered mentorship, motivation that helped minority engineering students succeed
In three decades leading Purdue’s Minority Engineering Program, Marion Blalock created recruitment, retention and graduation initiatives for underrepresented minority students that were so successful that the MEP became a model for universities across the nation.

After missing football team’s disastrous train ride, Harry ‘Snowy’ Clark became an athletic training pioneer at Purdue
Hired as Boilermakers’ first Black athletic trainer in 1900, Clark brought creativity, stability to emerging athletics programs Purdue’s Felix Haas Hall, originally known as Memorial Gymnasium, has 17 steps — one for each person who died in the 1903 train …

Purdue alumna, a U.S. athletic trainer, savors second chance to participate in her first Olympics
Anne Hinley landed her current job with US Speedskating in 2021 after working with the Chinese team prior to the COVID-19 pandemic As a Purdue student, Anne Hinley felt awkward about revealing to athletic training classmates and colleagues that her …

Purdue baseball team hopes Intel partnership will help Boilermakers become ‘the fastest show on dirt’
Purdue is nation’s first college baseball program to make use of Intel’s innovative 3DAT human performance technology Purdue’s baseball team aims to be “the fastest show on dirt.” A partnership with Intel is helping the Boilermakers turn that aspirational motto …

Boilermakers have played and sung ‘Hail Purdue’ across the globe — and even in space
Beloved fight song, celebrating its 110th anniversary in 2022, and school song ‘Purdue Hymn’ are the centerpiece numbers in the Purdue musical catalog Wherever and whenever Purdue Boilermakers cross paths, there exists the distinct possibility that they might break into …

Purdue’s one-of-a-kind theatre engineering program combines artist’s creativity, engineer’s diligence
Experiential learning opportunities prepare students to work in many forms of live entertainment Jessica Goldberg dreams of becoming a professional designer of theme park dark rides, creating immersive storytelling experiences like Disney’s Haunted Mansion, where guided vehicles transport guests through the …

Anonymous thank you leads to creation of ‘A Boilermaker Carol’
Student’s appreciative note to campus pianist served as inspiration for holiday-themed rendition of ‘Hail Purdue’ It all started with an anonymous thank you. What began on Reddit, with one Purdue student thanking another for a much-needed pick-me-up, resulted in this …

Sirisha Bandla took unconventional small steps before her giant leap into commercial spaceflight
Though setbacks could have deterred her, Bandla persisted and achieved her dream of going into space Sirisha Bandla’s earliest childhood memories involve lying on the roof of her family’s home in India and staring at the night sky. “In India, your …

Bringing a STEM approach to live entertainment
Purdue’s Fusion Studio for Entertainment and Engineering serves as a conversation hub connecting entertainment industry, practitioners and academia Shep Dick, Issy Block and their teammates thought they had found an ideal solution to the task at hand. And maybe they …

After harrowing escape from Afghanistan, Purdue instructor brings her family to West Lafayette
While instructor and family endured unthinkable circumstances back home, colleagues at Purdue rallied to support their fresh start in America With gunfire echoing all around them, Mariam (last name withheld) linked arms with her brother, Razeq, and sister, Fahima, as …

Fighter pilot, a Purdue alumna, was prepared to sacrifice her life on 9/11
Heather Penney planned to crash into hijacked United Flight 93 to prevent it from reaching Washington, D.C. For years after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, only a few people outside of Heather Penney’s immediate family were aware of …