The National Engineering Forum (NEF), along with the Georgia Institute of Technology and the Georgia Research Alliance, hosted a robust discussion about the future of American engineering Thursday night. The regional dialogue at the iconic Tech Tower brought together executive-level representatives from industry, academia, and government to discuss solutions to the challenges facing America’s engineering enterprise.

“Since our nation’s founding, the engineering enterprise has been the wellspring of our security and prosperity,” said Jeff Wilcox, Lockheed Martin’s vice president of engineering and founder of NEF. “The NEF movement is dedicated to bringing together stakeholders from across the engineering community and developing an actionable roadmap to ensure the sustainability of that enterprise.”

NEF’s regional dialogue series has been to 14 American engineering hubs, including New York, Los Angeles, Pittsburgh, Boston, and Chicago. Still ahead are dialogues in Phoenix and several more locations in the planning stages.

“NEF is a center of gravity pulling everyone together to face engineering’s challenges of capacity, capability and competitiveness. We call those challenges the 3C’s,” Wilcox said.

Atlanta was chosen as a regional dialogue city because of its significant role in technology, biomedical engineering, manufacturing, and education. Georgia Tech and the Georgia Research Alliance are ideal NEF hosts. Georgia Tech is a renowned science and technology-focused research institution, serving more than 13,000 students in the College of Engineering. The university is acclaimed for its achievements in clean, sustainable energy research, discoveries in diseases and treatment, and advancements in national defense and security, while the Georgia Research Alliance is aligned with

Georgia’s universities, and brings focus to science and industry in the region, launching new companies and creating high-value jobs.

“At Georgia Tech, we’ve learned that innovation solutions are many times interdisciplinary and the result of collaboration between education, business, industry, and government,” said Georgia Tech President G. P. “Bud” Peterson.

“Regional dialogues like this one, initiated by the National Engineering Forum, are helping to stimulate the conversation between thought leaders from all of these groups, and helping to build a community of action with tremendous potential in order to advance U.S. leadership in engineering.”

“Engineering talent is critical to the future of American innovation and competitiveness,” said C. Michael Cassidy, President and CEO of the Georgia Research Alliance.  “We were proud to cohost the NEF Regional dialogue and look forward to collaborating with our partners from the universities, business and government on how to address the needs of the U.S engineering enterprise.”

“It is critical that we bring together all those who have a stake in preserving and growing the American engineering enterprise,” said Chad Evans, executive vice president of the Council on Competitiveness. “We need engineers themselves,along with the business community, government leaders, educators and the media collaborating to enlighten our collective national consciousness about the power of engineering and its vital role in our nation’s competitiveness in the global economy.”

 About the National Engineering Forum:

The National Engineering Forum (NEF) brings together leaders concerned about the sustainability of the United States engineering field and the impact on the nation’s security and prosperity. NEF involves industry executives, academics, policymakers, media, engineering societies, and nonprofits to develop solutions to the challenges facing the U.S. engineering enterprise. For more on NEF, visit: www.nationalengineeringforum.com or follow us on Twitter @NatlEngForum.