Where is today's Patrick Henry University? I will argue that is Florida Institute of Technology, also known as Florida Tech.

Florida Tech is a private, non-tenure-granting university. The faculty here either prefer it that way, or at least realize that, if they work up to their own high standards, the tenure system would be irrelevant anyway.

I have been a professor for 15 years at Florida Tech in chemical engineering, and as of this year, biomedical engineering. Yes, I teach the future rocket scientists and engineers, as well as the Stealth technology necessary for generating a shield like Galt did for his gulch, in my materials science and engineering class, too.

Florida Tech has about 3000 on campus students and about the same number at our graduate sites at about ten military bases and space center sites (with apologies to true Rand followers). It is primarily an engineering college, with excellent colleges of science and psychology, and solid programs in business and aviation for future Galts, D'Anconias, Taggarts, Danneskjoelds, Reardens, etc. Florida Tech just made it into Tier 1 (the top 150 universities in the U.S.). Florida Tech is the youngest university in Tier 1, is the fastest growing university in the U.S. in Tier 1 (about 30% in the last two years overall and doubled enrollment in my departments in that time), and is the 3rd fastest growing university in the U.S. overall. There are better places to go to graduate school, but I would put our undergrads up against anyone's.

We do work hard, but we enjoy ourselves, too. We are in Melbourne, Florida (i.e. paradise - the beach equivalent to Galt's Gulch) where the temperature almost never gets over 90 degrees Fahrenheit (but is that temp for about 4 months) and where I don't even need to wear a tie to work. We get about one day of freezing per year and only about three days that don't reach 60 degrees Fahrenheit per year. Only a few days per year do I need a jacket (for warmth, not for work).

Besides the beach, there are lots of festivals, the Space Center, an Andretti theme park, lots of very affordable golf and housing, and the only zoo in the world with kayaking. Orlando is only an hour away, with all of its theme parks. By the way, today is the debut of Florida Tech's football team as well. Our best sports team is our crew team, which routinely places in the top five in the country nationally (including the big schools) because we have an intracoastal waterway only 1 mile from campus.

The cruise ships leave from about 40 minutes north of here. In fact, some of us have discussed as a final escape plan, if necessary, leaving the U.S., buying our own cruise ship, and turning it into the equivalent of our own Galt's Gulch-like country.

My primary focus has been developing a nanotechnology minor program that has more credits of lab than any others I have seen. I have funded that program and my research with about $100 K from my own pocket, purchasing items on EBay and LabX, and either getting them working myself or having students do it with me. I was able to afford to take this professorship with a slightly lower than average salary because of my investments I made in the 1990s during the dot.com boom. I am willing to take the slightly lower salary because I am more or less autonomous and not persecuted for not bringing in government grants like I would be elsewhere. I have gotten a couple of government grants before apologizing profusely for getting back some of the taxes that I have paid in), but prefer to work with industrial partners. At Florida Tech, if I bring in research contracts and can't publish for propietary reasons, that is acceptable (unlike the publish or perish elsewhere). In addition to the traditional research grants and contracts, we have a branch called Florida Tech Consulting for which you can pay only a 15% overhead rate for my (and perhaps my group's services) while keeping the intellectual property (IP) for your company.

At the risk of seeming un-Galt-like, having put $100 K into my university (primarily my own research group's work) myself, I do not apologize for asking for equipment or financial donations to support future Galts. Equipment donations are solicited in the areas of chemical, biomedical, mechanical, aerospace, electrical, and materials engineering, particularly nanotechnology and materials characterization equipment, in EXCHANGE for a) a tax deduction (so as to not feed the looters), b) the training of future Galts, and c) usage of all the materials synthesis and characterization facilities that I control on an as-needed, prompt basis (whether by you or by one of my students).

I see myself as like Quentin Daniels, John Galt's assistant from the Utah Institute of Technology. I have been a partner in two startup companies, including one started in someone's two story garage to build a plasma arc reactor similar to Mr. Fusion from the Back to the Future movies for the DeLorean. The equivalent to Mr. Fusion was invented by Dr. Albin Czernichowski, born in the 50's in Poland and emigrated to France after Poland was liberated. He is as close to John Galt as I likely will ever meet. My job was to build the process upstream and downstream of his reactor.

I've spent time on just about every side of the energy business from solar to oil to hydrogen to biofuels, specializing in applications of porous materials and nanoparticles such as a) catalysis for crude oil upgrading; b) hydrogen storage and purification (with apologies because part of that job was to supply tritium for nuclear bombs before I read Atlas Shrugged); b) Au and CdSe nanoparticles for biomedical imaging; c) tissue scaffolding generated from 1) electrospinning (the conventional way); 2) 3D printing; and even 3) a modified cotton candy maker; and finally d) biosensors for detecting whether a woman is pregnant (before being bought out by EPT to stay off the market) and recently for detecting biomarkers of Alzheimer's disease and shortly for detecting specific types of cancer cells.

If your kids are looking for this era's Patrick Henry University, e-mail me or call me at Florida Tech, where for a reasonable price at a private university, I will be glad to mentor future John Galts in nanotechnology, the field John Galt would have been in now had Atlas Shrugged been written today.

If you want on my e-mail list that advertises chemical, biomedical, aerospace, and mechanical engineering jobs posted on LinkedIn or in the east central Florida area, as well as nanotech, biomedical engineering, materials science, and 3D printing news, shoot me an e-mail and expect e-mail from my personal account, jb012767@aol.com.

If you or your son/daughter chooses to come to Florida Tech (also known as Florida Institute of Technology, or FIT), please notify me for $1000 off of your tuition per year by my referral.

Educating future Galts,
Prof. Jim Brenner
Florida Tech Chemical and
Biomedical Engineering Departments
Chair, Nanotechnology Minor Program
150 West University Blvd.
256 Olin Engineering Bldg.
Melbourne, FL 32901
jbrenner@fit.edu, jb012767@aol.com
http://my.fit.edu/~jbrenner
321-749-3437