As an award-winning engineer and dean at UC Berkeley, Tsu-Jae Liu champions diversity and inclusion to prepare the semiconductor workforce of the future.

Tsu-Jae Liu, recipient of the 2024 IEEE Founders Medal, has left an indelible mark on the engineering field with her leadership in advancing and commercializing nanometer semiconductor technologies and her pursuit of microelectronics workforce development. Also known for co-inventing the revolutionary FinFET transistor design, Liu’s contributions extend far within the engineering community. Combined with her continuing academic career at the University of California, Berkeley, we can be sure her colleagues and students deeply feel her dedication and influence.

From medicine to engineering: a career path defined by passion

Liu’s first knowledge of engineering came from her father. His degree in electrical engineering connected him to a community of electrical engineers who, upon emigrating to the U.S., gave the younger Liu the impression that engineers lived comfortable lives and enjoyed their work. It wasn’t until her own college experience, however, that she turned to engineering.

Initially interested in medicine, Liu learned she lacked the stomach for it after touring the anatomy lab at Stanford University’s medical school. However, she knew that engineers designed and built the instruments and technologies that doctors use to diagnose and treat patients. So, making that her inspiration, she earned a B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Stanford University. Afterward, she worked in industry before returning to academia. Presently, she is an IEEE Fellow and both Dean and Roy W. Carlson Professor of Engineering at UC Berkeley’s college of engineering.

Liu’s path to becoming UC Berkeley faculty began with her first job after graduation. Driven by her love of research, she joined the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, where she was exposed to the emerging industry of flat panel displays. As she’ll tell you, multiple American companies were interested in thought panel display technology, so research and interest in it were growing. They believed that these displays would eventually usurp the use of paper documents. Liu’s place in this research and UC Berkeley’s sustained interest in new and exciting areas of study created the opportunity for her to join the faculty of UC Berkeley’s Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences (EECS) in 1986. Perfect timing, as the U.S. government decided after that not to continue investing in the research, instead relying on suppliers of flat panel displays from other countries.

Championing diversity and inclusion in engineering

Today, Liu is not only a professor and dean working to create a welcoming environment for her and potential students at her university but also works with the American Semiconductor Academy (ASA) Initiative. The initiative’s purpose is to increase funding and unity among universities and community colleges so they retain more engineering students who, in their careers, will support the needs of a growing semiconductor infrastructure. The idea is for universities to share best practices and curricula, partnering with the semiconductor industry and the U.S. government to develop career pathways at the speed and scale necessary to meet the industry’s growing workforce needs (a need more than double the current output of graduates).

This is a natural extension of Liu’s work at Berkeley, as both stem from her belief that “As we increase the diversity of students and faculty, we don’t see the full benefit of that unless we change the culture to make it more inclusive and make everybody feel like they belong and are valued and respected as part of the community.” In her capacity as Dean and working with the ASA, her priority is to transform the engineering culture to support diversity and growth better. Even within the ASA, she wants any student from any major to feel like they have a path to the semiconductor industry if that’s what they want to do.

Bottom line: Liu wants every one of her students to feel “…like they are welcome and that they would be supported to thrive in [UC Berkeley’s] engineering programs. That’s the most important thing.” She also believes that this feeling shouldn’t end with her students. It should extend to all engineers, even if they don’t want to be engineers.

She explained, “Society is becoming ever more dependent on devices that engineers design and build. It’s good for doctors, lawyers, politicians, or just general citizens to understand and appreciate technology and engineering.” If nothing else, this line of thinking could greatly benefit the medical field — Liu has witnessed people who majored in engineering but ended up in medicine and have excelled, mainly because of their technical training. But beyond the technical, it is learning analytical thinking, problem-solving, and the ability to work with others that benefit engineers in other fields and leadership roles.

If widely accepted, this attitude would inevitably generate intersectional diversity in the engineering student body and, eventually, many major industries.

Empowering future engineers

Liu’s students want to save the world no matter what field they seek to do it in. Their institution’s job is to make them feel like they can, or at least like they have the resources to. Many of her students are interested in bioengineering/biomedical engineering, environmental engineering, and aerospace engineering because they care about health, ensuring a sustainable planet, space exploration, and occupying the Moon and then Mars, to extend their own lives and those of all humans. The younger generation cares about ensuring the future of humankind, but they have to feel what is possible and believe they can do it.

“What motivates students is knowing that what they do is really making a positive difference on people, society, or the planet,” said Liu. This type of motivation and confidence comes from feeling valued, welcomed, and respected — the exact kind of culture Liu seeks to imbue into the engineering community, starting with her own and universities across the country.

In addition to the accolades already mentioned, Liu’s leadership has been recognized by educators and industry with awards such as the Chang-Lin Tien Leadership in Education Award, the SRC Aristotle Award, and the IEEE EDS Education Award for outstanding contributions to education and achievements in diversity and inclusion. So, maybe her opinion is the expert one. With that in mind, here is some last expert advice from her.

“The old way of doing things wasn’t the best way. Just because you’re successful doesn’t mean that continuing to do things the same way will ensure continued success. One thing we as engineering researchers and professionals should realize is that the world is changing.”