SDSU, college celebrate McComish Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science

South Dakota State University leaders, faculty, staff, students and supporters celebrated a Montana couple whose investment has endowed the McComish Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in the Jerome J. Lohr College of Engineering. 

A $5 million gift from Richard “Dick” and Karen McComish created the university’s first endowed and named department. The McComishes were honored at an April 26 naming ceremony and reception at Chicoine Architecture, Mathematics and Engineering Hall. 

Both Dick and Karen are graduates of the SDSU Class of 1975, Dick with a degree in electrical engineering and Karen in sociology. 

They started Electrical Consultants Inc. from humble beginnings in a single office in Billings, Montana. With Dick’s engineering expertise and Karen’s administrative guidance, the McComishes’ leadership grew the company to a thriving corporation, encompassing over 950 engineers, surveyors and technical staff around the country. 

“I convey our heartfelt thanks to Dick and Karen McComish and the entire McComish family for their generosity,” said Sanjeev Kumar, dean of the Lohr College of Engineering. 

Kumar said the endowment will pave the way for impactful research, innovative programs and transformational experiences that will shape the future of SDSU and have a profound impact on the lives of students, faculty and the community. 

“Your philanthropic vision and commitment to excellence have forever transformed the landscape of this department,” Kumar said. “Your generous endowment will have a lasting legacy, providing invaluable support for generations to come. Countless lives will be touched, and countless dreams will be realized.” 

Dennis Hedge, SDSU provost and vice president for academic affairs, called this an exciting, rapidly accelerating new era of electrical engineering and computer science with emerging and changing technologies. He thanked the McComishes for showing their confidence in the department. 

“The department’s future is bright, and because of this amazing investment, your future is even brighter,” he told department faculty and staff, who are poised to develop bright minds and thought leaders to solve global challenges, including energy solutions. 

“This transformative gift we celebrate today is a tremendous boost to South Dakota State University’s efforts to play a leading role in this critically important and rapidly changing space. … Both of you (Dick and Karen) are an inspiration as we’ve been blessed by your loyalty, your dedication, passion, the confidence you’ve shown in our university through all your investments,” Hedge said. 

Dick McComish said he is in awe of the commitment and sacrifice educators make to prepare young students to be engineers and computer scientists who will improve lives. 

“SDSU is a flagship institution, in my opinion. You’ve achieved exactly this with tens of thousands of graduates,” he said. “SDSU is a model educational, and cultural, institution.” 

Karen McComish noted that South Dakota State has always been part of her life, with her aunts and her parents working here. “This is always the place I knew I was going to come to school, and I worked at the engineering firm for over 30 years, so the engineering department is very dear to me, too,” she said. 

“Our motivation is to recognize SDSU as an institution that helped make ECI a success story,” Dick McComish added. 

Learn more about the McComishes and their most recent gift to SDSU.