Making connections, helping others
Renzulli engineering endowment supports social good
Making connections, helping others
Renzulli engineering endowment supports social good
November 15, 2024Students often dream that all their hard-won college knowledge will help them make a positive impact in the world after graduation.
Thanks to the generous spirit of a donor and her family, some MSU engineering students are getting that chance even before they toss their caps.
The Peter and Daniel Renzulli Spartan Engineering Endowment Fund honors a father and son who were known for meaningful accomplishments. The fund supports charitable institutions that may not have the budgets to sponsor capstone project teams, connecting them with the talent and expertise of MSU engineering students eager to make a difference.
Capstone projects are the headliners at the College of Engineering’s Design Day, a premier event held at the end of every semester where hundreds of students showcase their engineering prowess. Their projects represent months of working in teams to find solutions to engineering challenges brought to them by the college’s corporate and nonprofit partners.
The Renzulli fund recently enabled the sponsorship of two projects in partnership with the Adventures in Training with a Purpose organization, which provides physical training for disabled veterans and others with physical challenges. One team created a prototype for helping people who cannot grasp or squeeze a handle. Another team designed a spring-loaded foot crutch.
The tangible results of projects like these are impressive. But the lasting benefit goes beyond the models, designs, systems and, even, the honors and awards. At the end of every Design Day, one of the most important things these students have made is connections.
That is a particularly fitting tribute for the Renzulli fund. Daniel and Daniel’s father, Peter, lost their lives in a small plane crash in 2018. Both men were consummate connectors, as Lori Renzulli, Daniel’s mom and Peter’s wife, puts it.
Daniel was a freshman in mechanical engineering who always had a calculator, or five, in his backpack. While earning a spot on the Dean’s List, he also left an indelible mark on countless Spartans.
He emptied his pockets to help unhoused people he encountered in the community. His fraternity brothers remember him as the first person they would turn to when they needed some encouragement, as someone who was “always willing to give up something of himself for the betterment of others.” Professor Jim Lucas, who led Daniel’s Freshman Seminar in Iceland, recalls, “Daniel was the sun, and the planets orbited around him.” Never embarrassed to greet his parents with a kiss and hug, Daniel followed his sister Meredith to MSU so he would stay close with her.
Peter was a successful certified public accountant, a CNN commentator, a caring part-time professor at Rutgers University and a tireless YMCA volunteer. He also was a hockey coach, a karate black belt, a pilot, a racecar driver, a devoted husband and father, and the kind of man who asked Lori to marry him within hours of meeting her for the first time.
“If he saw something, or someone, that interested him, he went all in,” says Lori.
He once learned of Battleship New Jersey’s need for help with an engineering project through a chance meeting with the museum’s curator. The next day, Peter cold-called the College of Engineering, and an MSU project with Battleship New Jersey became another part of his legacy.
Everyone who knew Peter or Daniel understood quickly that they brought people together, helped find creative solutions to complex problems, and were advocates and servants to vulnerable populations, Lori says.
The engineering students who will benefit from the Renzulli fund will get a head start on building their professional networks. They also will experience some of the first aha moments of their engineering careers as they work together to tackle a challenging problem, and, to make life better for people in need.
That’s a lot of connecting. And it sounds a lot like how Peter and Daniel would have done things.
LEARN MORE about support for the College of Engineering by contacting Associate Director of Development Brian Keehner at keehnerb@msu.edu or by calling (810) 845-1611.
