Professional & Fraternal Societies
BU IEEE Student Chapter
This professional society serves the broad spectrum of engineering applications of the electrical and computer sciences. More than 30 professional groups within IEEE cover a wide range of disciplines including all of the academic programs offered at the College of Engineering. Membership is open to all engineering and science students at Boston University.
BU IEEE HKN
Eta Kappa Nu is an IEEE honors society dedicated to encouraging and recognizing excellence in the electrical and computer engineering fields. Individuals are selected on the basis of scholastic standing, character and leadership. Through a variety of service programs and leadership training, student members develop lifelong skills that prepare them for prominent positions in industry and academia.
Tau Beta Pi Association
This national engineering honor society was founded in 1885 to offer appropriate recognition for superior scholarship and exemplary character to engineering students and professional persons. Tau Beta Pi has collegiate chapters at 205 institutions and a total initiated membership of more than 358,000 people.
Theta Tau
Theta Tau is a professional co-ed engineering organization. It is the oldest, largest, and foremost fraternity for engineers that has grown to over 35,000 members and 91 chapters and colonies across the nation since its inception. The purpose of Theta Tau is to instill and maintain a high standard of professionalism among its members, embrace a strong bond of fraternal fellowship, and foster the intellectual pursuits of engineering.
Community & Solidarity
National Society of Black Engineers
The National Society of Black Engineers aims to maintain the mission “to increase the number of culturally responsible Black engineers who excel academically, succeed professionally, and positively impact the community.” We are a chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE) but we accept any member who cares to support our cause or who feels that they may benefit from our efforts. We aim to serve as active members in our University, our community, and in NSBE through events, community service, and attendance at NSBE conferences.
Society of Asian Scientists and Engineers
The Society of Asian Scientists and Engineers (SASE) was founded in November 2007 to help Asian-heritage scientific and engineering professionals achieve their full potential. Organizations existed for other affinity groups—the National Society of Black Engineers, the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, and the Society of Women Engineers—and there was a need for a similar organization where students representing all of the pan-Asian cultures could connect and support each other. Boston University students, in association with a representative from GE Aviation, established a new collegiate chapter of SASE to support the national initiatives of SASE at our campus. Activities include networking, panel discussions, company visits, and lectures.
Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers
The society promotes the development of Hispanics in engineering, science, and other technical professions to achieve educational excellence, economic opportunity, and social equity. Its objectives are to increase educational opportunities; promote professional and personal growth; implement the social responsibilities related to education, business, and government issues; and enhance the reputation of, and students’ pride in, the organization and its vital contributions.
Society of Women Engineers, Student Section
This professional society is a nonprofit, educational service organization of graduate women engineers and women with equivalent engineering experience. The objectives of the society are: to inform young women, their parents, counselors, and the general public of the qualifications and achievements of women engineers and the opportunities open to them; to assist women engineers in readying themselves for a return to active work after temporary retirement; to serve as a center of information on women in engineering; to encourage women engineers to attain high levels of educational and professional achievement. Membership is open to all students in the College of Engineering.
Special Interests & Activities
Business and Technology Club
The Boston University BizTech Club is run through the Questrom School of business, and is dedicated to fostering strong connections between students interested in pursuing careers in tech, between those students and companies and other organizations with project, internship and job inquiries, and building strong relationships between students and technology-focused faculty and alumni. Activities include speaker recruitment, skill building lectures, and networking opportunities.
CleanTech Club
Founded in 2019, CleanTech Club is a student-led Boston University organization created to bring together those enthusiastic about sustainability and technological innovation. The club is a campus group dedicated to cultivating a community and culture around engineering solutions that help the planet.
Energy and Sustainability Club
The BU Energy and Sustainability Club aims to synthesize energy and environmental sustainability-related ideas from a multi-disciplinary stream of educational and professional sources to advance understanding of energy and sustainability and its role within society, industry, technology and policy through empirical, objective energy and sustainability-related education and outreach.
Engineers Without Borders
Engineers Without Borders is a nonprofit humanitarian organization that partners with developing communities worldwide in order to improve their quality of life. The group’s mission includes implementing sustainable engineering projects and training internationally responsible engineers and engineering students.
FIRST Robotics Team
FIRST means “For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology” and is a national organization (www.usfirst.org) that encourages high school students to get excited about science and technology. Every spring hundreds of teams across the country design and build robots to play in a game specified by the FIRST organization. The robots compete in regional competitions in March/April; winners then go to Atlanta, Georgia, for the national competition at the end of April. Check out their Instagram for competition photos!
Global Engineering Brigades, BU Chapter
Global Engineering Brigades aims to design, engineer, and implement sustainable clean water systems.
High Performance Computing
Boston University High Performance Computing is part of a consortium of universities including MIT, Northeastern, Harvard, and UMass. We teach students from the ground up about super computing and high performance computing relevant knowledge. The club participates in Student Cluster Competitions, which are international supercomputing contests all around the world. BU HPC is dedicated to using what we’ve learned from our workshops and projects to push the boundary of what supercomputers are capable of.
Materials Research Society
The mission of the Materials Research Society Chapter at Boston University is to encourage communication about the advancement of interdisciplinary materials research in order to improve the quality of life. The chapter aims to build a dynamic and interactive local community of student and faculty materials researchers to advance technical excellence by providing a framework in which the materials disciplines can convene, collaborate, integrate and advocate.
Mars Rover Club
The Boston University Mars Rover Club (BUMRC) is a Mars-focused, Earth-based student organization established at Boston University. Majoring in anything from electrical engineering to business, members from all backgrounds work together year-long to create a rover capable of traversing rough terrain, interacting with its environment, and analyzing samples for signs of life.
Rocket Propulsion Group
The BU Rocket Propulsion Group is an undergraduate student group which focuses on the design, research, and development of rockets and rocket engines. The BU Rocket Propulsion Group’s current project is research in hybrid rocket engine performance. In the past the team has designed, built and tested several solid fuel rocket engines including an aerospike rocket engine.