Alexander Schure (August 3, 1920 – October 29, 2009) was an American

academic An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary education, secondary or tertiary education, tertiary higher education, higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membershi ...

and

entrepreneur Entrepreneurship is the creation or extraction of economic value. With this definition, entrepreneurship is viewed as change, generally entailing risk beyond what is normally encountered in starting a business, which may include other values th ...

. Schure founded the

New York Institute of Technology The New York Institute of Technology (NYIT or New York Tech) is a private research university founded in 1955. It has two main campuses in New York—one in Old Westbury, on Long Island, and one in Manhattan. Additionally, it has a cybersecu ...

(NYIT) in 1955. He also served as the

Chancellor Chancellor ( la, cancellarius) is a title of various official positions in the governments of many nations. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the or lattice work screens of a basilica or law cou ...

Nova Southeastern University Nova Southeastern University (NSU or, informally, Nova) is a private nonprofit research university with its main campus in Davie, Florida. The university consists of 14 total colleges, centers, and schools offering over 150 programs of study. ...

(NSU) from 1970 until 1985.

Career

Schure is credited with saving Nova University, which was in deep financial trouble, after he became the school's chancellor in 1970. The university is now called Nova Southeastern University, and is now the largest

private university Private universities and private colleges are institutions of higher education, not operated, owned, or institutionally funded by governments. They may (and often do) receive from governments tax breaks, public student loans, and grant (money ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

, with more than 28,000 students as of 2009. Schure and then-Nova University President Abraham Fischler,

Ed.D. The Doctor of Education (Ed.D. or D.Ed.; Latin ''Educationis Doctor'' or ''Doctor Educationis'') is (depending on region and university) a research or professional doctoral degree that focuses on the field of education. It prepares the holder for a ...

, formed a federation between Nova and the

. The

partnership A partnership is an arrangement where parties, known as business partners, agree to cooperate to advance their mutual interests. The partners in a partnership may be individuals, businesses, interest-based organizations, schools, governments o ...

between the two institutions brought money and new programs to Nova University. The money from NYIT allowed Nova University to remain open during its financial difficulties. The

alliance An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...

between NYIT and Nova University ended in 1985. When Schure founded NYIT, the university had

open admissions Open admissions, or open enrollment, is a type of unselective and noncompetitive college admissions process in the United States in which the only criterion for entrance is a high school diploma or a certificate of attendance or General Education ...

intended to promote education of the

underprivileged Social privilege is a theory of special advantage or entitlement, which benefits one person, often to the detriment of others. Privileged groups can be advantaged based on education, social class, caste, age, height, weight, nationality, geogra ...

. Because many of these students struggled with math, he hired a comic book artist that could draw the math lessons for them. This approach seemed successful, so Schure got the idea to convert the drawn lessons into an animated educational film which won a gold medal in the New York International TV film festival. Encouraged by the success, he wanted to go further with animation and decided to write, direct and produce a feature called Tubby the Tuba. What he hadn't realized was how time consuming and painstaking it would be to do each frame by hand, which inspired him to use modern computer technology to help with the animation process. This technology did not exist yet, and so had to be created first. In November 1974 Schure hired recent University of Utah doctoral graduate

Edwin Catmull Edwin Earl "Ed" Catmull (born March 31, 1945) is an American computer scientist who is the co-founder of Pixar and was the President of Walt Disney Animation Studios. He has been honored for his contributions to 3D computer graphics (computer sci ...

to direct NYIT's fledgling

computer graphics Computer graphics deals with generating images with the aid of computers. Today, computer graphics is a core technology in digital photography, film, video games, cell phone and computer displays, and many specialized applications. A great de ...

lab, and ensured that the lab received special funding for more than 5 years. In 1979 Catmull left to form a computer-graphics group with

Lucasfilm Lucasfilm Ltd. LLC is an American film and television production company and a subsidiary of Walt Disney Studios, which is a business segment of The Walt Disney Company. The studio is best known for creating and producing the ''Star Wars'' and ' ...

and the core technical team—including computer animation pioneers

Alvy Ray Smith Alvy Ray Smith III (born September 8, 1943) is an American computer scientist who co-founded Lucasfilm's Computer Division and Pixar, participating in the 1980s and 1990s expansion of computer animation into feature film. Education In 1965, A ...

David DiFrancesco David DiFrancesco, (born Nutley, New Jersey, 1949), is a photoscientist, inventor, cinematographer, and photographer. He is a founding member of three organizations which pioneered computer graphics for digital special effects and film with Edwin ...

, Ralph Guggenheim, Jim Blinn, and

Jim Clark James Clark Jr. OBE (4 March 1936 – 7 April 1968) was a British Formula One racing driver from Scotland, who won two World Championships, in 1963 and 1965. A versatile driver, he competed in sports cars, touring cars and in the Indianapol ...

—came from the NYIT lab. (In 1986, that computer-graphics group would be funded by recently fired

Steve Jobs Steven Paul Jobs (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American entrepreneur, industrial designer, media proprietor, and investor. He was the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple; the chairman and majority shareholder of Pixar; a ...

as the independent company Pixar which manufactured and sold image-processing computers using the concepts first developed at NYIT, and also produced projects using them.) Although Clark would move on to found

Silicon Graphics Silicon Graphics, Inc. (stylized as SiliconGraphics before 1999, later rebranded SGI, historically known as Silicon Graphics Computer Systems or SGCS) was an American high-performance computing manufacturer, producing computer hardware and soft ...

and

Netscape Netscape Communications Corporation (originally Mosaic Communications Corporation) was an American independent computer services company with headquarters in Mountain View, California and then Dulles, Virginia. Its Netscape web browser was onc ...

, the rest of the NYIT team continued to play key roles as Pixar's animation developed from its first short films in the mid-1980s onward. It can be said that Dr. Schure's vision and support from 1975 to 1980, and the low-pressure academic research lab environment at NYIT, was an essential contributor to the development of many of the technical innovations needed to produce realistic computer generated films. He funded the computers and frame buffers used in the making of the unfinished computer-generated film " The Works".

Death

Alexander Schure died from complications of

Alzheimer's disease Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegeneration, neurodegenerative disease that usually starts slowly and progressively worsens. It is the cause of 60–70% of cases of dementia. The most common early symptom is difficulty in short-term me ...

on Long Island on October 29, 2009, at the age of 89. He was survived by his second wife, Gail; and four children - Dr. Barbara Schure Weinschel, Dr. Matthew Schure, Louis Schure, and Dr. Jonathan Schure. Following his death, former NSU president Fischler said Schure "was a brilliant individual with a very creative mind. He was an excellent friend to me and the university. There would be no NSU without him." He received doctoral degrees in engineering and education from New York University.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Schure, Alexander 1920 births 2009 deaths Presidents of New York Institute of Technology New York Institute of Technology faculty Nova Southeastern University people Polytechnic Institute of New York University alumni American animated film directors University and college founders Deaths from dementia in New York (state) Deaths from Alzheimer's disease 20th-century American academics