Bio

Scott Kennedy enters the 2024-25 season in his second year as Anderson University assistant tennis coach and chaplain, and his twentieth year on the Anderson University faculty. He will begin his first year as chair of the AU Engineering Department this season.

Dr. Kennedy, “doc” to the AU tennis players, competed on his high school tennis team but his academic goals took him to a nationally ranked D1 school so playing collegiate tennis was not in the cards. During his post-doctoral fellowship at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) in the Washington D.C. area, Kennedy played in a government agency tennis league where his team from NIST competed against teams from other agencies like the Army, Navy, FBI, CIA, State Department, etc. NIST won first place out of 18 teams in the league both of the years Kennedy played, and he continues to play regularly in local club and USTA leagues. 

Following the 2013-2014 academic year, Kennedy was recruited by Google’s “moonshot X-labs” to co-design and build the first prototypes of a ‘smart’ accommodating contact lens as part of Google’s Smart Lens Program that evolved into a versatile electronics platform that can support actions like sensing and transmitting data on the eye. While there, Kennedy helped develop the accommodating contact lens from a proof of concept prototype to a clinically relevant product. He co-authored 11 patent applications and created new rigid gas permeable materials with stringent materials specifications. During this time, he scaled back his teaching duties at AU, but continued to serve the university as an adjunct professor. After the Smart Lens Program transitioned from development to manufacturing, Kennedy returned to his full-time position at AU in 2021. He continues to work on developing new applications for smart contact lenses through his consulting business which, in addition to meeting the needs of its clients, also provides exciting internship and research opportunities to Anderson University students.

Kennedy received his Bachelor of Science in Materials Engineering from the University of Illinois in 1996, his Masters of Science from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst in 1998, and his Ph.D. (also from UMass) in 2002.  While on sabbatical in 2012, Kennedy earned his MBA from Anderson University.