New UWEC center aims to assist industry, organizations

The Office of Corporate and Community Partnerships (OCCP) was created with the help of a $400,000, three-year National Science Foundation grant, and is the primary entry point for industry, agencies and organizations to connect with the university about consulting and partnering on their research and development needs.

Industries interested in collaborating with UW-Eau Claire will have access to faculty expertise and student researchers, says Dr. Doug Dunham, interim director of strategic partnerships and program development who manages the OCCP. 

“I’ve always been very passionate about trying to connect the university with industry and other organizations,” Dunham says. “We have both the expertise and the instrumentation. In some cases, industries need analysis done and they don’t have the ability to do it. We have both the equipment and the expertise to help with that.

“When you start to see the university as a whole there are so many really smart people here who can help solve all kinds of issues, but we have to know what those issues are.”

On Oct. 18, the OCCP will host the conference “University Partnerships: Unlocking Potential” for local and regional businesses to learn how they can collaborate on projects with UW-Eau Claire. The event will be from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. in the Council Oak Room of Davies Center.

A higher education institution the size of UW-Eau Claire may be in a better position to assist industries than top-tier urban research universities whose faculty are primarily focused on publishing faculty research and obtaining research grants, Dunham says.

“At UW-Eau Claire, we’re more tied to the community,” Dunham says. “The faculty have the expertise and if an opportunity comes, we can be more flexible than bigger schools can be. Certainly, we can be more responsive and I think more willing to listen, especially for small companies.”

Academic departments and the UW-Eau Claire Foundation already collaborate with more than 350 businesses, organizations and government agencies. The new office will keep an inventory of those joint efforts and look for opportunities to expand the collaborations into strategic partnerships, Dunham says.

“The goal isn’t to just have a partnership, but to have an ongoing partnership, establish something that is long term,” Dunham says. “As the company’s needs or the community agency’s needs change, we can change with that. As the needs change, we can still satisfy those needs.”

Establishment of the OCCP demonstrates UW-Eau Claire’s commitment to providing students with opportunities to engage in distinctive learning experiences, says Dr. Michael Carney, interim provost and vice chancellor for academic affairs.

“Research collaborations with industry and community partners gives students a clear line of sight on the impact of their work,” Carney says. “For many projects, students can see the impact of their work almost in real time, which is incredibly motivating and rewarding.

Among the ongoing campus collaborations are those involving students of Dr. Patricia Cleary, professor of chemistry and biochemistry, who have worked in UW-Eau Claire laboratories on a project with Superior Fresh, an aquaponic organic farm near Northfield in Jackson County. Cleary says the project allows her students to interact with industry scientists and get a glimpse of real-world business operations.

“It’s a direct application of their learned chemistry skills,” Cleary says. “In this partnership, we have access to instrumentation and supplies here at UW-Eau Claire that our industrial partner doesn’t have. We can do more sophisticated analysis with their samples to give them more helpful indicators.”

Successful student-faculty partnerships with industries are beneficial to all parties involved, Dunham says. Blugold students experience high-impact practices and make connections with local and regional companies while industries get a look at their future workforce.

“Sometimes we hear from companies that they don’t get applicants because no one knows what they do,” Dunham says. “We can change that. We want industries to come on campus because there are ways to get them involved that aren’t expensive — just to be active here and to get their brand known to the students.”