{"id":23479,"date":"2025-02-18T00:46:15","date_gmt":"2025-02-18T07:46:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/fort-lewis-college-recognized-with-carnegie-designation-as-research-institute\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T22:37:25","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T04:37:25","slug":"fort-lewis-college-recognized-with-carnegie-designation-as-research-institute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/fort-lewis-college-recognized-with-carnegie-designation-as-research-institute\/","title":{"rendered":"Fort Lewis College recognized with Carnegie Designation as research institute"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"A
A student research assistant in a professor\u2019s lab at Fort Lewis College in 2014. FLC recently received a coveted Carnegie Designation that recognized the school's growing investment in undergraduate research. (Durango Herald file)<\/span>du1-i-syn<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Fort Lewis College recently received a Research Colleges and Universities designation from the 2025 Carnegie Classifications of Institutes of Higher Education that recognized the school\u2019s growing investment in undergraduate research.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is really exciting to have this new classification,\u201d said Nardy Bickel, the college\u2019s spokeswoman. \u201cWe think we\u2019re pretty unique as an undergraduate institution, and this is another recognition of the work we\u2019re doing, both for our students and in our larger community.\u201d<\/p>\n

The CCIHE<\/a> is a framework used to describe and categorize institutions of higher education across the U.S. Classification is determined through levels of research activity, degree offerings and institutional missions.<\/p>\n

Prior to 2025, there were only two classifications<\/a> for research universities, disqualifying schools without doctoral programs. The new category, \u201cResearch Colleges and Universities,\u201d is awarded to institutions that spend at least $2.5 million a year on research and development, regardless of whether they offer doctoral programs.<\/p>\n

The designations were posted on Feb. 6.<\/p>\n

In recent years, Fort Lewis has massively expanded its research portfolio.<\/p>\n

As of December 2024, the college had invested nearly $50 million in research, a 36% increase over 18 months, according to a news release from the college.<\/p>\n

Bickel said research at Fort Lewis spans a wide range of topics, with more than 100 projects.<\/p>\n

It gives students hands-on experience that they may not have access to at larger universities, Bickel said.<\/p>\n

She highlighted the Thermal Hydraulics Lab, led by Billy Nollet, associate professor of Physics & Engineering. With the help of undergraduate students, Nollet\u2019s lab develops instruments, pumps, filters and mechanical systems for liquid sodium cooling systems.<\/p>\n

FLC is one of only five universities<\/a> engaged in this type of sodium research.<\/p>\n

Bickel said the amount of experience students receive, not just in Nollet\u2019s lab but in the countless others across campus, gives them a leg up when applying to postgraduate research programs.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause they\u2019re able to get into the lab before other people, when they apply to grad school, they can go straight to the PhD programs, which is quite amazing,\u201d Bickel said.<\/p>\n

Fort Lewis students have installed solar panels on the Navajo Nation, analyzed downtown transportation for Durango Transit, and investigated previously undocumented behaviors of regional plant and animal species, Bickel said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s a benefit to the community,\u201d she said, \u201cbut it\u2019s also a benefit to the students who are doing this research.\u201d<\/p>\n

jbowman@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

December 2024, FLC spent $50 million on undergraduate research <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":23480,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[155,132,28,2582],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-23479","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-education","tag-fort-lewis-college","tag-headlines","tag-research"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23479","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23479"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23479\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78142,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23479\/revisions\/78142"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/23480"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23479"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23479"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23479"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=23479"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}