Elings donates $1 million to DP Engineering
updated: Dec 17, 2009, 1:53 PM

Source: SB Schools

Local resident Virgil Elings has made a $1 million gift to the Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy (DPEA) for the construction of a new facility at Dos Pueblos High School. In recognition of this gift, the new building will be named the Elings Center for Engineering Education.

The Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy is a four-year integrated course of study in physics, computer science and engineering that enrolls 128 students. The Engineering Academy is seeking to grow by building a new 12,000 square-foot facility that will have laboratory and classroom space for 400 students. The capital campaign to match a $3 million California state grant to fund the construction of the new facility is led by the Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy Foundation, a local nonprofit foundation.

The Elings gift is the largest contribution to date for the capital campaign. With this recent gift, a total of $1.76 million has been contributed to the campaign by the community.

"Dos Pueblos is sincerely grateful to Dr. Elings for his extraordinary generosity and we are pleased to have the new building bear the Elings name," said Dos Pueblos High School principal Mark Swanitz.

"We are so thankful for Virgil Elings to step forward once again and show such generosity for our students and their futures," stated Santa Barbara School Districts' Superintendent Brian Sarvis

Amir Abo-Shaeer, director of the Engineering Academy, said, "Dr. Elings has chosen to invest in the future of education for our youth. The expanded DPEA will serve over 400 students and will provide a model for science and engineering education throughout California and the nation."

Virgil Elings is a former UCSB professor of physics who started and supervised a Masters Degree Program at UCSB in which the students did project-based learning, as opposed to book learning. Dr. Elings also founded and built a Santa Barbara company, Digital Instruments, along with former students in the Masters program, that through rapid innovation was the world leader in its field. Dr. Elings would like to encourage and support the focus on project-based learning and innovation in the Engineering Academy.

For further information on the Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy, contact Director Amir Abo-Shaeer at amir@dpengineering.org. For information about the DPEA Foundation, contact Sandra Seale at seale@dpeaf.org.

Dos Pueblos High School is located at 7266 Alameda Avenue, Goleta, CA 93117, (805) 968-2541.

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