Atchison, Kansas

BCYC Immersion Engineering Track

Student soldering wires to make a robot

This track is available:

  • Session 1 (June 15-20, 2025)
  • Session 2 (July 6-11, 2025)

Study with Benedictine College engineering professors who know how to lead students in solving real world problems. Teens in the Engineering Track build and test mechanical devices in hands-on classes in an experience similar to a standard engineering summer camp. Outside the daily classes, they join other students in the prayer and fellowship activities that make BCYC Immersion such a great youth experience.

Benedictine College’s School of Engineering is one of the fastest-growing areas of the college. This track will help participants grow in understanding of the rules of this applied science, learning through first-hand experience and lab demonstrations facilitated by Benedictine Engineering professors.

Track Instructor

Andrew Downs

Dr. Andrew Downs

Assistant Professor, School of Engineering

Dr. Downs earned B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in 2010 where his work focused on additive manufacturing of passive microwave circuits and antennas. After graduation, Dr. Downs worked as a nuclear engineer for Puget Sound Naval Shipyard in Bremerton, Washington. Tiring of the rain, he returned to the Midwest to work as a project engineer for Interstates Control Systems in Sioux Center, Iowa. Four years later, and unable to neglect a call to teach, Dr. Downs entered graduate school at Iowa State University.

While at Iowa State, Dr. Downs helped develop an improved method of multi-mode dispersion compensation for ultrasonic guided wave NDT (nondestructive testing). Dr. Downs’s research interests are many, but he has a particular interest in wave phenomena – both electromagnetic and elastic. Other interests include, reconfigurable and ultra-wideband antennas, sensor design and the scholarship of teaching and learning.

Degrees

  • BS, Electrical Engineering, South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, 2008
  • MS, Electrical Engineering, South Dakota School of Mines and Technology, 2010
  • PhD, Electrical Engineering, Iowa State University, 2021