FACULTY NEWS
Innovative, Creative Engineering Professor Installed in New Academic Chair
Dan Jensen helped establish Westmont’s engineering program and joined the faculty full time in 2021 to direct it and chair the department. In just three years, he has developed the curriculum, guided construction of an engineering facility, grown the number of engineering students, hired professors, recruited an impressive advisory board, and been installed in the James R. and Eleanor S. Allder Chair of Science and Technology. He has also applied for accreditation from the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology.
“We’re celebrating the provision and goodness of God in building the program and making it work,” Jensen says. “We’re excited about what God is choosing to do through us.”
Eleanor Shepley Allder and her late husband, James, donated $2 million to the college to establish the endowed chair in science and technology. They support Westmont’s commitment to excellence in technical training and the integration of engineering design and innovation built on a solid Christian liberal arts foundation. Their three daughters graduated from Westmont as did two of their sons-in-law and three of their grandchildren.
“We want to encourage intellectual rigor in the sciences coupled with solid Christian beliefs and support a lead faculty member in equipping young Christian scholars who want to pursue careers in science and technology,” Eleanor Allder says.
James Russell Allder Jr. served as a Navy electronics and radar technician and majored in physics at Caltech before earning a doctorate in engineering at UCLA. He worked as an engineer for the Aerospace Corporation, a nonprofit consultant to the U.S. Air Force. Eleanor Allder taught elementary school, focusing on students with special needs, and later earned a master’s degree from CSU Dominguez. She mentored special education teachers in the Los Angeles Unified School District and helped establish an English as a second language program at Rolling Hills Covenant Church.
Eleanor Allder attended Jensen’s installation in the science and technology chair on November 8 with members of her family. Jensen’s brother, Jason, vice president for spiritual formation at InterVarsity, delivered the charge. Fellow professor Robert Haring-Kaye (physics) and Michael Hendricks, director of Life Model Consulting, inventor and former software developer, joined Jensen in a panel discussion, Considering Technology, Science and Spirituality from Different Perspectives Including Engineering Design, Neurological Science and Cosmology. Jensen also presented a brief overview of how his research relates to spirituality and engineering.
Westmont’s engineering program stands on three pillars: a strong technical background with small classes and hands-on active learning; a Christian liberal arts approach; and the integration of engineering design and innovation. In addition to Jensen, the excellent faculty includes Adam Goodworth, a biomechanical engineer who previously taught in the kinesiology department, mechanical engineer Doug Fontes and Will Allison, a mechanical design engineer.
Jensen works closely with the Engineering Advisory Board, which features leaders in a variety of engineering fields in industry and higher education. Board members provide money for programs, speak in class regularly, mentor students, sponsor a design team and hire Westmont graduates. In particular, they share their experiences as Christian engineers.
Jensen earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering, a master’s in applied mechanical engineering and a doctorate in aerospace engineering at the University of Colorado. He spent 21 years on the faculty at the Air Force Academy and also taught at the University of the Pacific and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories. He has published more than 150 peer-reviewed articles in design methods, innovation and related areas.
“The professors at Westmont are walking out a critical calling every single day, equipping the next generation,” Eleanor Allder says. “I’m humbled and grateful to be part of God’s plan for the college and build an enduring legacy in this way.”
