A Smith College professor is being hailed for devising a national model for re-engineering an undergraduate engineering program for women.

Today’s Christian Science Monitor profiles Glenn Ellis, a professor who helped develop Smith’s innovative engineering curriculum, which emphasizes context, ethics, and communication as much as formulas and equations.

Smith, the first women’s college to offer an engineering degree, graduated its first class of engineers in 2004, and since the program’s creation, in 1999, has attained a 90-percent retention rate. Much of the credit, colleagues say, belongs to Mr. Ellis, whose fun, hands-on approach to engineering includes staging mock alpine ascents in the classroom and having his students graph the function of a moonwalk.

Mr. Ellis, who in November was named a “Professor of the Year” by the Council for Advancement and Support of Education and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, has also been an advocate for reforming mathematics and science education in elementary and secondary schools. He is writing an engineering-themed novel for adolescent girls.

“It is just not good enough to teach the way that we were taught,” Mr. Ellis said at the November awards ceremony. “We know that doing so in engineering will surely exclude many of the young people we need to attract.” —Paula Wasley