A Comparative Analysis of Engineering Research Expenditures in Selected Big 12 Universities

A comparative analysis of engineering annual research expenditures for four selected Big 12 universities, over a seven year period (2001 -2007), is reported.The four universities selected for this study are: University of Oklahoma (OU), Oklahoma State University (OSU), University of Colorado at Boulder (UC), and University of Texas at Austin (UT).The American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE) public domain database is utilized as the source of data used in this study.In addition to a comparative analysis of the overall annual research expenditures of these schools, some program specific comparisons are made.Specifically, the following programs are considered: Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering, Chemical Engineering, Civil Engineering and Environmental Science, Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Science, and Industrial Engineering.In spite of steady increase in nation-wide competition for federal funding for engineering research, the Big 12 universities considered in this study have done fairly well in terms of annual research expenditures in engineering.In terms of overall annual research expenditures, UT dominated the group, followed by UC.