Sharing his views at a public lecture on campus, the former President of MIT urges universities to create exciting and empowering environments, and to innovate to help solve the problems of the world.

The most important thing universities can do is foster innovation through education, says Dr Charles Vest, President Emeritus of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
Speaking at a public lecture at NTU on 7 November, the 57th Lee Kuan Yew (LKY) Distinguished Visitor said that universities must be driven to excel.

"Its work is essential to our future and our institutions should be motivated to be the very best they can."

Dr Vest, whose talk was titled "Universities, Innovation, and Economic Development", emphasised that universities generate, interpret and transmit much of human knowledge, so it is natural that they have an increasing role in economic development.

Open, innovation-driven and multidisciplinary
Universities should be open and willing to "share expertise and tools freely with all who want to teach and learn", says Dr Vest. "We must foster innovation through new research organisations, through more interdisciplinary labs, centres and institutions, and through multi-institutional collaborations."

He feels that universities should draw on their convening powers to bring people together through "economic development activities".

Empower, don't just teach
Dr Vest - who is Professor of Mechanical Engineering at MIT and researches thermal sciences and the engineering applications of lasers and coherent optics - considers the environment we create today more important than the details of the curricula we put together.

"I strongly believe that making our universities - especially our engineering schools - exciting, creative, adventurous, rigorous, demanding and empowering environments, is more important than specifying curricula detail."

Solving real-world problems
The public lecture - which attracted a capacity crowd - ended with a plea from Dr Vest: "I believe it is important for all of us to turn some of our innovative capacity toward working on the world's truly fundamental problems, things such as our environment, food, water, health, energy and the significance of the aging of our populations."

Yet, despite the important role universities play in innovation and economic development, their traditional roles as conservators of culture, heritage and values – and as critics and analysts of culture and society – must be cherished and stewarded.
In Singapore from 1 to 10 November, Dr Vest visited NTU and held meetings with the university's senior management and faculty. He also met other top education and government officials and delivered two public lectures – at NTU and the National University of Singapore (NUS).

Great interest in NTU
Dr Vest took a great interest in NTU's development. Noting that the university was at a critical juncture as it charted its next stage of growth, he was later quoted as saying that it had made "remarkably positive" progress over the last five years.

Established in 1983, the Lee Kuan Yew Visitors Programme brings eminent academics and scholars to Singapore to make high-level contributions to both NTU and NUS. So far, Singapore has welcomed 56 Distinguished Visitors through the programme.

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