More Articles on Rice Hall Dedication

‘Technologically Inspiring’ Rice Hall is Dedicated, UVa Today, 19 November 2011.

To Innovate, ‘Make Sure the Experts Think You’re Nuts,’ Kamen Tells Engineers, UVa Today, 19 November 2011.

Kamen told his audience of mostly engineering students and professors that one way to make innovation happen is to “make sure the experts in the field think you’re nuts.” He said new ideas should go from “indefensible to indispensible,” and that innovative thinking will lead to many failures but also to new ways to solve society’s most challenging problems, such as clean water and power shortages for two-thirds of the world’s population.

As a boy, he said, he was inspired by the “David and Goliath” story, in which little David defeated the giant Goliath with technology – a slingshot. He encouraged the future engineers to think beyond their own fields. “Become interested in people from different fields, different backgrounds and see what you can do that’s new. You have this little spot of time between eternities to do something amazing – don’t waste it.”

Rice Hall Dedication, NBC 29, 18 November 2011.