National Society of Black Engineers

National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE)

Motto	To increase the number of culturally responsible Black engineers who excel academically, succeed professionally, and positively impact the community.
Formation	1975 (1975)
Founders	Anthony Harris Brian Harris Edward A. Coleman Stanley L. Kirtley George A. Smith John W. Logan Jr. Arthur Bond
Type	Engineering Society
Headquarters	205 Dangerfield Road, Alexandria, Virginia
Region served	International
Membership	30,000
Official language	English
National Chairperson	Matthew Nelson
Budget	$8,000,000 annually
Staff	30
Website	www.nsbe.org

The National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE), was founded in 1975 Purdue University located in West Lafayette, Indiana by six undergraduates and a faculty advisor. It is one of the largest student-run organizations in the United States, with core activities centered on improving the recruitment and of Black and other minority engineers, in both academe and industry. NSBE is an organization that provides opportunities for personal and professional success, and remains unmatched by any other organization to date.

NSBE has more than 30,000 members world-wide, with 2,000 elected leadership positions, 18 regional conferences, an annual international conference, and an annual national convention. Since its inception over forty years ago, NSBE has grown to include approximately 310 collegiate student chapters, 99 pre-college programs, and 88 professional chapters with their 6,000 technical members. A professional staff operates NSBE's World Headquarters in Virginia.

In addition, NSBE has a number of corporate partners and affiliations that facilitate its mission and primary directives, which are essentially engineering excellence and community service. NSBE's Board of Corporate Affiliates (BCA) are businesses interested in diversity, and include companies like Boeing, General Motors, Dow, IBM, United Technologies, Dell, all branches of the American Military, DuPont, 3M, Toyota, Intel, Johnson & Johnson, Lockheed Martin, and many other note-worthy industries. With its corporate partners, dedicated students and professionals, NSBE has accomplished more for Black engineering students and working engineers than any other organization in the world.

When Anthony Harris was an undergraduate student studying engineering at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana, he became aware of the alarming attrition rate by minorities, as early as their sophomore year. Determined to fix the leaky pipeline of Black students from freshmen year through graduation and beyond, Harris approached the university's administration about establishing a minority mentoring/networking society in 1971. There was quite a bit of initial resistance, but finally a fledgling Black Society of Engineers (BSE) was founded in 1975 by John Logan, Edward Coleman, George Smith, Stanley Kirtley, Brian Harris, and Anthony Harris (nicknamed 'The Chicago Six'), along with their designated faculty advisor, Arthur Bond. Anthony Harris proposed that the group change its name to the Society of Black Engineers (SBE) in 1976.