USC College of Engineering gets new name after $30M donation
USC's college of engineering and computing adds "Molinaroli" to school name after a $30 million donation from retired Johnson Controls CEO Alex Molinaroli. The University of South Carolina is renaming its engineering college after a $30 million donation from former Johnson Controls CEO Alex Molinaroli and his family. The donation will help fund new programs, support research, and recruit faculty and staff. The university hopes this will create a "virtuous circle" where the university offers unique programs that improve economic development and bring quality engineering jobs to the state. The college will also offer programs combining interests in power generation, green energy and energy storage to provide students with a more well-rounded education. Molarinoli's donation will also support a partnership with USC's business school for leadership and business management skills.
发表 : 11 个月前 经过 Sydney Dunlap [email protected] 在 Environment
COLUMBIA — The University of South Carolina is naming its engineering college the Molinaroli College of Engineering and Computing after a $30 million donation from former Johnson Controls CEO Alex Molinaroli and his family.
Molinaroli graduated from USC with a degree in electrical and computer engineering in 1983 and began working at Johnson Controls' Columbia office soon after. He worked his way up to serving as the company's CEO from 2013 to 2017.
In South Carolina, he most notably oversaw the opening of a battery recycling plant in Florence. Then serving as president of Power Solutions, Molinaroli called the site "the most innovative battery recycling operation in the world."
With Molinaroli's eight-figure donation, the university plans to fund new programs, support research and recruit faculty and staff. He hopes it will be the first step in creating a "virtuous circle" where the university offers unique and relevant programs that improve economic development and bring quality engineering jobs to the state.
The engineering college will start offering programs combining interests in power generation, green energy and energy storage while also providing students with a more well-rounded education, Molinaroli said. The former CEO's donation will also support a partnership with USC's business school so students can gain leadership and business management skills.
"We have a great technical set of resources, great work environment, but we don't necessarily have the high tech skills," Molinaroli said. "So I think that a different set of jobs can come in that creates opportunity for a student so they don't have to leave the state in order to get a job."
USC President Michael Amiridis, who served as the dean of the College of Engineering and Computing from 2006 to 2009, said the Molinaroli family's donation is part of a "new era" for the college.
话题: Academia, USC, Environment-ESG