The Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering is an academic division of the
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...
devoted to study and research in engineering. Founded in 1873 as the ''School of Practical Science'', it is still known today by the longtime nickname of Skule. The faculty is based primarily across 16 buildings on the southern side of the university campus in
Downtown Toronto, in addition to operating the
Institute for Aerospace Studies
An institute is an organisational body created for a certain purpose. They are often research organisations (research institutes) created to do research on specific topics, or can also be a professional body.
In some countries, institutes can ...
facility. The faculty administers undergraduate, master's and doctoral degree programs, as well as a dual-degree program with the
Rotman School of Management
The Joseph L. Rotman School of Management (commonly known as the Rotman School of Management, the Rotman School or just Rotman) is the University of Toronto's graduate business school, located in Downtown Toronto. The University of Toronto has be ...
.
History
![Mining Building](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/01/Mining_Building.JPG)
The School of Practical Science (S.P.S.) was created in 1873 by an act of the
Legislative Assembly of Ontario
The Legislative Assembly of Ontario (OLA, french: Assemblée législative de l'Ontario) is the legislative chamber of the Canadian province of Ontario. Its elected members are known as Members of Provincial Parliament (MPPs). Bills passed by ...
. The school was to serve the needs of a growing economy at a time marked by rapidly evolving sciences and technologies. In 1878, the school enrolled its first class for a three-year curriculum in the subjects of mining, engineering, mechanics and manufacturing.
The school was established as an affiliate of the
University of Toronto
The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...
, but operated as a separate institution. The first classes were held in a red-brick building that was known as the "Little Red Skulehouse" by attending students. The school was renamed as the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering on June 20, 1906, when it officially became part of the university. In 1949, the
University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, the ...
opened for graduate studies and research in aeronautical and space sciences. In 1962, the Institute of Biomedical Electronics (now Institute of Biomedical Engineering) was established for graduate studies. The original Skulehouse was finally demolished in 1966, by which time the faculty had already expanded to occupy a dozen other buildings that formed an engineering precinct in the southern part of campus.
The
Bahen Centre for Information Technology
The Bahen Centre for Information Technology is a building at the St. George campus of the University of Toronto. It is primarily used by the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering, the Department of Computer Science and the Department of ...
was completed in 2002 to meet the growing needs of the university’s computer science and electrical and computer engineering programs. Designed by Diamond + Schmitt Architects, the $111 million facility contains 20,000 gross square metres and is named for John Bahen, the president of
Peter Kiewit and Sons
Kiewit Corporation is an American privately held construction company based in Omaha, Nebraska founded in 1884. In 2021, it was ranked 243rd on the Fortune 500. Privately held, it is one of the largest construction and engineering organizations ...
. The centre was described by ''Canadian Architect'' magazine as "a complex interweaving of urbanity, public space and sustainability", and it won the Ontario Association of Architects Award, the City of Toronto Architecture and Urban Design Award, and bronze in the environmental category of the National Post Design Exchange Award.
Academics
![EngineeringAndComputerScienceLibrary](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/06/EngineeringAndComputerScienceLibrary.JPG)
There are 5,090 undergraduate students and 1,842 graduate students enrolled in the faculty, with 43,000 living Skule alumni worldwide. The undergraduate programs are conducted by the departments of
chemical,
civil
Civil may refer to:
*Civic virtue, or civility
*Civil action, or lawsuit
* Civil affairs
*Civil and political rights
*Civil disobedience
*Civil engineering
*Civil (journalism), a platform for independent journalism
*Civilian, someone not a membe ...
,
computer
A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...
,
electrical,
industrial
Industrial may refer to:
Industry
* Industrial archaeology, the study of the history of the industry
* Industrial engineering, engineering dealing with the optimization of complex industrial processes or systems
* Industrial city, a city dominate ...
,
materials,
mechanical
Mechanical may refer to:
Machine
* Machine (mechanical), a system of mechanisms that shape the actuator input to achieve a specific application of output forces and movement
* Mechanical calculator, a device used to perform the basic operations of ...
, and
mineral
In geology and mineralogy, a mineral or mineral species is, broadly speaking, a solid chemical compound with a fairly well-defined chemical composition and a specific crystal structure that occurs naturally in pure form.John P. Rafferty, ed. ( ...
engineering. The faculty awards Bachelor of Applied Science (BASc) degrees for all undergraduate engineering programs, with the exception of the Engineering Science program, in which a Bachelor of Applied Science in Engineering Science is awarded. The faculty also offers graduate degrees. The Master of Engineering (MEng) degree consists of 1 year of full-time study, primarily requiring the completion of coursework and/or a major project. The Master of Applied Science (MASc) degree consists of 2 years of full-time study, and requires the completion of course work and a major thesis. Unlike the MASc, which leads to a PhD degree, the MEng is a terminal degree.
Courses in several majors overlap: the electrical engineering curriculum shares courses with the computer engineering curriculum in the first two years, while chemical engineering shares a set of courses with the environmental engineering option of the civil engineering department. The undergraduate
engineering science program consists of courses from a broad range of departments and places greater emphasis on theory than in a traditional engineering curriculum. In the final two years of the program, each student specializes in one of several concentration options, including
biomedical engineering
Biomedical engineering (BME) or medical engineering is the application of engineering principles and design concepts to medicine and biology for healthcare purposes (e.g., diagnostic or therapeutic). BME is also traditionally logical sciences ...
,
aerospace engineering
Aerospace engineering is the primary field of engineering concerned with the development of aircraft and spacecraft. It has two major and overlapping branches: aeronautical engineering and astronautical engineering. Avionics engineering is si ...
, and
machine learning
Machine learning (ML) is a field of inquiry devoted to understanding and building methods that 'learn', that is, methods that leverage data to improve performance on some set of tasks. It is seen as a part of artificial intelligence.
Machine ...
.
The faculty requires undergraduate students to accumulate 600 hours of engineering work experience, commonly obtained through employment in between academic terms. Students may also choose to participate in a paid
intern
An internship is a period of work experience offered by an organization for a limited period of time. Once confined to medical graduates, internship is used practice for a wide range of placements in businesses, non-profit organizations and gover ...
ship program called the Professional Experience Year, which involves employment at an engineering company for a period of 12 to 16 months. The
Jeffrey Skoll program allows engineering students to earn a bachelor's degree in engineering from the faculty followed by a
Master of Business Administration
A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...
degree from the
Rotman School of Management
The Joseph L. Rotman School of Management (commonly known as the Rotman School of Management, the Rotman School or just Rotman) is the University of Toronto's graduate business school, located in Downtown Toronto. The University of Toronto has be ...
.
Admissions standards are specific to each department, and the faculty had an entry average of 93.7%. In 2010-2011, Engineering Science had an entry average of 93%, and averages have been increasing yearly since then.
Research
Collaborations with industry
On April 7, 2022, the University of Toronto announced a partnership with American
biotechnology
Biotechnology is the integration of natural sciences and engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms, cells, parts thereof and molecular analogues for products and services. The term ''biotechnology'' was first used b ...
company
Moderna
Moderna, Inc. ( ) is an American pharmaceutical and biotechnology company based in Cambridge, Massachusetts that focuses on RNA therapeutics, primarily mRNA vaccines. These vaccines use a copy of a molecule called messenger RNA (mRNA) to produ ...
intended to develop new tools to prevent and treat
infectious diseases
An infection is the invasion of tissues by pathogens, their multiplication, and the reaction of host tissues to the infectious agent and the toxins they produce. An infectious disease, also known as a transmissible disease or communicable dise ...
, collaborating with researchers in the fields of
molecular genetics,
biomedical engineering
Biomedical engineering (BME) or medical engineering is the application of engineering principles and design concepts to medicine and biology for healthcare purposes (e.g., diagnostic or therapeutic). BME is also traditionally logical sciences ...
, and
biochemistry
Biochemistry or biological chemistry is the study of chemical processes within and relating to living organisms. A sub-discipline of both chemistry and biology, biochemistry may be divided into three fields: structural biology, enzymology and ...
. The collaboration is a joint venture across U of T's Faculties of Applied Science & Engineering and
Medicine
Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pract ...
.
Traditions and student life
Founded in 1885, The University of Toronto Engineering Society is the oldest
engineering society
An engineering society is a professional organization for engineers of various disciplines. Some are umbrella type organizations which accept many different disciplines, while others are discipline-specific. Many award professional designations, s ...
in Canada, comprising all undergraduate students in the faculty, and serving as its student government. The Society has been the trademark holder for the ''Skule'' nickname since 1984. Usage of the nickname began in the founding years of the School of Practical Science, when students used "skule" as a deliberate misspelling of "school".
The Skule mascot is known as the Ye Olde Mighty Skule Cannon, which began as a
cannon
A cannon is a large- caliber gun classified as a type of artillery, which usually launches a projectile using explosive chemical propellant. Gunpowder ("black powder") was the primary propellant before the invention of smokeless powder ...
stolen from in front of the
Parliament Buildings in the fall of 1898, and has since been rebuilt in several incarnations. Students serving as "Cannon Guards" are led by a "Chief Attiliator" to protect the Cannon, which has been historically a target for attempted theft by other engineering schools. The Cannon is often fired (empty-shelled) during orientation events, and can also be heard during various events promoting Skule Spirit.
In September 2021, the University of Toronto Engineering Society, in partnership with the Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering, launched a Skule Mental Health Bursary, to provide access to mental health and wellness support for Engineering undergraduate students who are in need of financial aid.
Social events
The Skule Orchestra, founded in 2006, is a full symphonic
orchestra
An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families.
There are typically four main sections of instruments:
* bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, c ...
of engineering students. It organises Moment, the Valentine's Ball. Every year the Skule Choir, led by Malcolm McGrath, puts on a Christmas concert, usually located in
Knox College Chapel
Knox College is a postgraduate theological college of the University of Toronto in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It was founded in 1844 as part of a Schism (religion), schism movement in the Church of Scotland following the Disruption of 1843. Knox is ...
with Malcolm McGrath on the main
pipe organ
The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air (called ''wind'') through the organ pipes selected from a keyboard. Because each pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ''ranks ...
and the Skule Brass Quintet.
The
Lady Godiva Memorial Bnad The (LGMB) is a student-run scramble band within the University of Toronto Engineering Society. The band is notable for its open membership policy and sometimes audacious and surprise appearances at events, venues and university lectures.
Origina ...
(sic) and "White Noise Brigade" draws its name from the Godiva tradition. Like several other universities, Skule students frequently sing
Godiva's Hymn (or the Engineer's Hymn) and revere
Lady Godiva
Lady Godiva (; died between 1066 and 1086), in Old English , was a late Anglo-Saxon noblewoman who is relatively well documented as the wife of Leofric, Earl of Mercia, and a patron of various churches and monasteries. Today, she is mainly reme ...
. The first week of classes in January following Christmas holidays is designated Godiva Week, and features numerous events, competitions and activities.
The Skule community hosts events, parties, activities, inter-faculty sports, a yearly musical production entitled Skule Nite and special interest lectures throughout the year.
Toike Oike
The phrase ''Toike Oike'', variously pronounced ''toy-kee-oyk'' or ''toyk-oyk'', is derived from an Irish janitor named Graham who was employed in the original School of Practical Science building. When students worked late in the labs and he had to close up the building, he would tell them to "take a hike", which sounded like "toike oike" due to his Irish accent. The phrase is used as the name of the engineering society's humour newspaper, the ''Toike Oike'', in print since 1911. At some points in its publishing history, the humour could be extremely sexual and misogynistic, especially given the predominant male enrollment. One of the more popular editions was a parody of the popular movie Star Wars, rebranded Star Whores. Because of its huge popularity on campuses, copies had to be gotten the day of publication, and would be sold out the next day.
It is also the inspiration for the lyrics of the Skule Yell, the cheer of the engineering society and likely the oldest surviving Skule tradition:
:Toike Oike! Toike Oike!
:Ollum te Chollum te Chay!
:Skule of Science, Skule of Science
:Hurray! Hurray! Hurray!
:We Are (we are!), We Are (we are!), We Are the Engineers!
:We Can (we can!), We Can (we can!), Demolish Forty Beers!
:Drink Rum (straight!) Rum (straight!) And Come Along With Us,
:For We Don’t Give a Damn For Any Damn Man Who Don’t Give a Damn For Us!
:Yaaaay Skule!
The Brute Force Committee: Needs identification of its role in Skule. It was an organization which was Skule’s cultural leadership.
Before the adoption of the Skule Yell, the original cheer was significantly shorter:
:Who are we? Can’t you guess?
:We are from the S.P.S.
:S-C-H-O-O-L!!
Both Skule and the rest of the university recognized the original cheer as inadequate, so the first four lines of the new yell were proposed by A. G. Piper and adopted in 1897. The new yell was first performed that year at Theatre Night, a major campus-wide event for all faculties held on
Halloween
Halloween or Hallowe'en (less commonly known as Allhalloween, All Hallows' Eve, or All Saints' Eve) is a celebration observed in many countries on 31 October, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Saints' Day. It begins the observanc ...
. The last four lines of the yell are essentially the chorus of
Godiva's Hymn, and were first added on November 25, 1905, during the procession from
Rosedale Field to the
King Edward Hotel
The Omni King Edward Hotel is a historic luxury hotel in Downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The hotel is located at 37 King Street (Toronto), King Street East, and it occupies the entire block bounded by King Street on the north, Victoria Street ...
following a victory of the
Toronto Varsity Blues rugby team over the
Ottawa Rough Riders
The Ottawa Rough Riders were a Canadian Football League team based in Ottawa, Ontario, founded in 1876. Formerly one of the oldest and longest-lived professional sports teams in North America, the Rough Riders won the Grey Cup championship nine ...
. During the game, Casey Baldwin, a Skuleman, had made a spectacular play in the last minutes to win the dominion championship for the university.
Notable alumni
*
H. E. T. Haultain
Herbert Edward Terrick Haultain (9 August 1869 – 19 September 1961) was a Canadians, Canadian engineer and inventor.
He was born in Brighton, England and died in Toronto, Toronto, Ontario. He graduated from the University of Toronto with a deg ...
(class of 1889) – Founder of
The Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer
The Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer is a private ritual, authored by Rudyard Kipling, in which students about to graduate from an engineering program at a university in Canada are permitted to participate. Participation may also be permit ...
*
Frederick Walker Baldwin (class of 1906) – Designer of the ''
Silver Dart'', ''
White Wing'' and ''
Red Wing'' aircraft
*
Karl Brooks Heisey (class of 1922) - Mining engineer and mine president
*
Elsie MacGill Elsie may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Elsie (given name), a list of people and fictional characters
* Lily Elsie (1886–1952), English actress and singer born Elsie Hodder
* Robert Elsie (1950–2017), Canadian expert in Albanian ...
(class of 1927) – First female aircraft designer, "Queen of the Hurricanes"
*
Jim Chamberlin
James Arthur Chamberlin (May 23, 1915 – March 8, 1981) was a Canadian engineer who contributed to the design of the Canadian Avro Arrow, NASA's Gemini spacecraft and the Apollo program. In addition to his pioneering air and space efforts, he ...
(class of 1936) – Chief designer of the
Avro Arrow, chief of engineering for
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research.
NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...
's
Project Mercury
*
Gerald Bull (class of 1944, M.A.Sc. 1948, Ph.D. 1951) – Ballistics engineer and developer of long-range superguns
*
Lewis Urry (class of 1950) – Inventor of the
alkaline battery and the
lithium battery
Lithium battery may refer to:
* Lithium metal battery, a non-rechargeable battery with lithium as an anode
** Rechargeable lithium metal battery, a rechargeable counterpart to the lithium metal battery
* Lithium-ion battery, a rechargeable batte ...
*
Owen Maynard
Owen Eugene Maynard (October 27, 1924 – July 15, 2000) was a Canadians, Canadian engineer who contributed to the designs of the Canadian CF-105 Avro Arrow jet interceptor, and of NASA's Apollo program, Apollo Lunar Module (LM). Maynard was a mem ...
(class of 1951) - Senior Stress Engineer on the
Avro Arrow, Chief of Lunar Excursion Module Engineering, then of Systems Engineering and of Mission Operations in
NASA
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil space program, aeronautics research, and space research.
NASA was established in 1958, succeeding t ...
's
Project Apollo Program Office
*
Alan Milliken Heisey Sr.
Alan Milliken Heisey Sr. (May 20, 1928 – 2 November 2014) was a Canadian publisher, author, activist, political columnist and politician from Toronto who wrote the book ''The Great Canadian Stampede - The Rush to Economic Nationalism - Right or ...
(class of 1951) - Anti-nationalist, politician and publisher
*
Peter Munk
Peter Munk (November 8, 1927 – March 28, 2018) was a Hungarian-Canadian businessman, investor, and philanthropist. He was the founder and chief executive officer of a number of high-profile business ventures, including the hi-fi electronics co ...
(class of 1952) – Founder and chairman of
Barrick Gold
Barrick Gold Corporation is a mining company that produces gold and copper with 16 operating sites in 13 countries. It is headquartered in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It has mining operations in Argentina, Canada, Chile, Côte d'Ivoire, Democrati ...
*
Paul Godfrey
Paul Victor Godfrey, CM, OOnt (born January 1939) is a businessman and former Canadian politician. During his career, Godfrey was a North York alderman, Chairman of Metro Toronto, President of the ''Toronto Sun'' and head of the Toronto Blue ...
(class of 1962) – Politician and former president of the
Toronto Blue Jays
The Toronto Blue Jays are a Canadian professional baseball team based in Toronto. The Blue Jays compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the American League (AL) East division. Since 1989, the team has played its home games ...
*
Alfred Aho (class of 1963) – Co-creator of the
AWK programming language
AWK (''awk'') is a domain-specific language designed for text processing and typically used as a data extraction and reporting tool. Like sed and grep, it is a filter, and is a standard feature of most Unix-like operating systems.
The AWK langu ...
, co-author of ''
Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools''
*
Brian Kernighan (class of 1964) –
Bell Labs
Nokia Bell Labs, originally named Bell Telephone Laboratories (1925–1984),
then AT&T Bell Laboratories (1984–1996)
and Bell Labs Innovations (1996–2007),
is an American industrial research and scientific development company owned by mult ...
scientist, co-author of ''
The C Programming Language'' and ''
The UNIX Programming Environment''
*
Bernard Sherman
Bernard Charles "Barry" Sherman, (February 25, 1942 – December 13, 2017) was a Canadian businessman and philanthropist who was chairman and CEO of Apotex Inc. With an estimated net worth of US$3.2 billion at the time of his death, acco ...
(class of 1964) – Chairman and CEO of
Apotex
Apotex Inc. is a Canadian pharmaceutical corporation. Founded in 1974 by Barry Sherman, the company is the largest producer of generic drugs in Canada, with annual sales exceeding . By 2016, Apotex employed over 10,000 people as one of Canada's la ...
*
Kim Vicente
Kim Vicente is an inactive professor of Mechanical Engineering, Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at the University of Toronto. He was previously a researcher, teacher, and author in the field of human factors. He is best known for his two ...
(class of 1985, prof. of industrial engineering 1992–) – Author, ''
The Human Factor''
*
Jeffrey Skoll (class of 1987) – First employee and president of
eBay
eBay Inc. ( ) is an American multinational e-commerce company based in San Jose, California, that facilitates consumer-to-consumer and business-to-consumer sales through its website. eBay was founded by Pierre Omidyar in 1995 and became a ...
*
Julie Payette
Julie Payette (; born October 20, 1963) is a Canadian engineer, scientist and former astronaut who served from 2017 to 2021 as Governor General of Canada, the 29th since Canadian Confederation.
Payette holds engineering degrees from McGill ...
(M.A.Sc. 1990) – Astronaut and Governor General of Canada
*
Isabel Bayrakdarian
Isabel Bayrakdarian ( arm, Իզապէլ Պայրագտարեան; born February 1, 1974) is a Lebanese-born Canadian operatic soprano of Armenian descent who now resides and works in the United States.
Early life
Born in Zahlé, Lebanon, into an ...
(class of 1997) – Opera singer
*
George Myhal
George may refer to:
People
* George (given name)
* George (surname)
* George (singer), American-Canadian singer George Nozuka, known by the mononym George
* George Washington, First President of the United States
* George W. Bush, 43rd President ...
(class of 1978, Hon. LL.D. 2018) - Former senior managing partner of
Brookfield Asset Management, philanthropist
References
Further reading
*Robin Sutton Harris, Ian Montagnes. ''Cold Iron and Lady Godiva: Engineering Education at Toronto, 1920-1972''.
University of Toronto Press
The University of Toronto Press is a Canadian university press founded in 1901. Although it was founded in 1901, the press did not actually publish any books until 1911.
The press originally printed only examination books and the university calen ...
, 1973. .
*Richard White. ''The Skule Story: The University of Toronto Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering''. University of Toronto Press, 2000. .
*Catherine Moriarty. ''John Galbraith, 1846-1914: Engineer and Educator''. University of Toronto Press, 1989. .
External links
University of Toronto, Faculty of Applied Science & EngineeringSkule, the University of Toronto Engineering SocietySkule TraditionsSkulepedia, a repository of Skule history by alumni and studentsArchival papers of Vernon Russell Davies lecturer at the faculty who ran Vernon Davies Tutorial School, are held at th
University of Toronto Archives and Records Management ServicesArchival papers of Barry French Professor (1961-?) and Associate Director of University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies (1982-1985), held at th
University of Toronto Archives and Records Management ServicesBahen Centre, University of Toronto
{{Coord, 43.660057, N, 79.394829, W, region:CA-ON_type:edu_source:GoogleMaps, format=dms, display=title
Applied Science and Engineering, Faculty of
Toronto
Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...