Westlawn Institute was SOLD

Discussion in 'Boat Design' started by cneville, Jan 4, 2015.

  1. Leo Lazauskas
    Joined: Jan 2002
    Posts: 2,696
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    Location: Adelaide, South Australia

    Leo Lazauskas Senior Member

    I see what you did there. :)

    It might take a few years to settle into the new mode of teaching, and all of
    the associated administrative and mechanical requirements to run in the new
    way. I hope they attract a lot of old retired prof and lecturers who are willing
    to donate time to teaching, just out of pure love for their fields of expertise.
     

  2. u4ea32
    Joined: Nov 2005
    Posts: 416
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    Location: Los Angeles

    u4ea32 Senior Member

    A year on now...

    Westlawn is in great shape, and continues to improve.

    Last year, it took until the second business day of the year to become positive cash flow. We have increased enrollment by 50%, and increased the rate that students work through the material.

    The new board and management is all working Pro Bono (free, no salary) as we restore the financial integrity of the school.

    We have the same instructors as before: Westlawn as seen by our students is the same Westlawn, only better.

    Westlawn continues to enroll new students who have already graduated from leading universities with bachelor's and master's degrees in engineering, naval architecture, and product design, including Webb, Michigan, Southampton, and Art Center during 2015. If someone wants to learn yacht design, Westlawn continues to be the clear choice.

    We are well on our way with the new technology platform. We want it to be a big improvement, not just different.

    We have been very successful in our new classroom courses offered in partnership and at Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, CA. Our top student from our second course won an internship with Palmer Johnson in Monaco.

    We have been focusing on increasing the return on investment for our students by increasing the rate they can progress through the course, and by providing more tools and training in those tools.

    For example, all enrolled students now have free full versions of all software from Autodesk (AutoCAD, SolidWorks, Alias, etc) and Bentley (Maxsurf, Microstation), with deeply discounts available for Rhino and Orca3d. Free online and in some cases classroom courses are available to all enrolled students. Also, instead of having to pay, as I personally did, about $2K for the minimum set of ISO rules, Westlawn has entered into a license with rulefinder.net to provide free access to our enrolled students to call 15000+ rules documents by ISO, ABYC, DNV, etc.

    We now provide all books for free, including the latest editions by Blount, Larsson, and Fossati.

    Professionally, we have learned that students must be adept with software tools in order to provide value to their employers. Hence our continued focus on enabling our students to learn and use the tools they will need after they graduate. Some students have been using SolidWorks to 3d print designs.

    We have also started a collaboration with Morrelli and Melvin to bring all M&M software used for multihull and hydrofoil design to our students. This is a daunting effort, but we are underway. One patent related to this effort is being filed currently. We are working with experts in control system and CFD on this endeavor.

    So Westlawn is healthy, and improving in every way.
     
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