Linda C. Schmidt
I received a lot of advice from both male and female colleagues on ‘how to fit’ in order to be successful. I was just too stubborn to follow all the advice, and this risk gave me a lot of anxiety. Earning tenure gave me confidence in being myself and demonstrated that the traditional professor model is becoming more inclusive.
Professor
Department of Mechanical Engineering
A. James Clark School of Engineering
Linda C. Schmidt is a Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Maryland and an ASME Fellow, who joined the University of Maryland in 1995 as an Assistant Professor. In 2001, she became the first woman to achieve tenure in the Department of Mechanical Engineering. Her research interests are in understanding the process by which early stage, engineering design tasks are successfully completed in order to create effective methods for learning design and preserving knowledge that arises in the process. Her current work involves studying student design journal content for insight on thinking during design. Schmidt is also George Dieter's co-author for the 4th, 5th, and upcoming 6th editions of the McGraw Hill text “Engineering Design."