Marmion instructor wins $100,000 Grant from Dassault Systèmes U.S. Foundation for the CPARC Engineering Center at Marmion Academy 

Aurora, IL – With a focus on virtual prototyping for businesses using SIMULIA Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) tools, Marmion Academy instructor Dr. Victor Pinks, II ’72 created CPARC (Computational Prototyping And Research Center), a business-centric CAE workforce/education and evolving curriculum. CPARC has been bridging traditional education at Marmion Academy with new teaching models and real-world business project work since 2013, preparing its students for a future in Computer Assisted Engineering. 

The $100,000 grant from Dassault Systèmes will be used to increase the business throughput capacity of CPARC. Currently CPARC operates several high core count workstations in addition to pre-flight stations. Supercomputing assets for CFD (Computational Fluid Dynamics) simulations will become available this fall. 

Through its partnerships with many small local businesses, federal agencies, aerospace, defense, fortune 50 and specialty housing (disaster proof and zero carbon footprint) Marmion CPARC students are exposed to real world workplace engineering challenges. These students collaborate with CPARC science advisors and company decision makers. Teams are co-led by Marmion’s CSWA/CSWP certified SolidWorks students who as adjunct business interns for company engineers and decision makers. Curricular topics also cover soft skills development and are being expanded toward business-centric needs such as “Lean Simulation.” 

Sample simulations can be viewed on the “Marmion CPARC” YouTube channel. 

Marmion Academy, a Catholic-Benedictine college preparatory school for young men, is a community dedicated to spiritual formation, academic excellence, and leadership development. For more information on Marmion Academy visit www.marmion.org.