Ware Lab

Celebrating 20 years of Design Build Excellence.

In Fall 2018, the Joseph "Joe" F. Ware, Jr. Advanced Engineering Lab celebrated 20 years of providing engineering students the opportunity to create, build, and bring to fruition their senior capstone projects. Some twenty years ago, very few research universities had integrated maker-spaces on their campus. Thanks to the foresight and vision of Joe Ware and his wife Jenna, experiential learning is enhanced for the Virginia Tech student engineer.

The Ware Lab is one of the first spaces on Virginia Tech’s campus dedicated to the development of an undergraduate engineering build space. Prior to the founding of the Ware Lab, the university’s design teams meet in multiple spaces spread across campus in various academic buildings. Thanks to the generosity and vision of Ware, multidisciplinary teams can interact in a common space.

The lab removes boundaries that often separate engineering professions. In real-world practice, engineers from different disciplines will work together. Students who work in the lab are highly recruited by to top tier companies who frequent the lab looking for the well-rounded, globally minded engineers who have had hands on experiences.

Interested in learning how you can make an impact on engineering students by helping Virginia Tech Engineering scale up this maker space? Go here to support the College of Engineering. For more information, call (540) 231-3628.

Ware Lab Open House

About the Ware Lab

Joe Ware and his wife Jenna Ware co-founded the Laboratory with Hayden Griffin, Ph.D. in 1998.

The Ware Lab houses undergraduate design projects in the College of Engineering where students sharpen theoretical and computational skills learned in the classroom by working on challenging, viable engineering projects. A “hands-on, minds-on” approach has led to a tradition of success for Virginia Tech engineering students — in the classroom, as members of award winning competition. More than 450 students, some receiving academic credit and others serving as volunteers, participate as early as their freshman year.