In Honor of Black History Month, CEAT Recognizes Dr. Legand Burge, Jr.
Friday, February 9, 2018
STILLWATER, Okla. – Dr. Legand Burge, Jr. was inspired at an early age to achieve great things through engineering.
Burge’s father, an electronics radar technician, left a profound impact on his life. Burge, Sr. served in the U.S. Navy during World War II and rose to the rank of master sergeant in the U.S. Air Force after the war. He continued to work with radar technology for the Federal Aviation Administration upon returning home.
“In 1957, there was this Sputnik thing that happened,” said Burge. “President Kennedy had made an announcement at his inauguration that by the end of the decade we would be going to the moon as a result of Sputnik. Several things opened up to a lot of folks that participated in that, and it became the inspiration that inspired all of us. I was in high school in Oklahoma City, and I was saying ‘this is something I could do.’ I went into electrical engineering and the rest is history.”
Upon graduating from Oklahoma City’s Douglass High School in 1967, Burge was offered a scholarship to study at Oklahoma State University. There he earned his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering in 1971. Through his acceptance to the Air Force Institute of Technology, he earned his master’s degree in 1973 from OSU. After four years of service at the Sunnyvale Air Force Base, Burge returned to Oklahoma State to earn his Ph.D. in electrical engineering in 1979.
Burge’s career has focused on information theory, coding theory, digital signal processing and communications – areas of research that had become very popular during the 1970s and 1980s with the rise of both commercial technology and the military needs of the Cold War.
Burge taught at the Air Force Academy before being selected to serve in the Intermediate Service School at the Air Command and Staff College. Shortly after, he was invited to work at the Pentagon under General Colin Powell’s supervision.
“What I ended up going into was the International Programs Office,” Burge said. “I was assigned to all of the Research and Development Programs for the United States, which was quite a challenging job.”
This allowed Burge to travel all over the NATO nations, a significant part of Burge’s life. In 1987, Burge became a lead researcher at the National Security Agency and later returned to the Pentagon, working in financial evaluation for the defense secretary. Burge retired from the military as a colonel in 1999 after having served as vice commander of the entire Air Force ROTC program and the dean of the Acquisition Management School at the Defense Systems Management College.
After his retirement, Burge was named a professor of electrical engineering and Dean of the College of Engineering, Architecture, and Physical Sciences at Tuskegee University, one of the oldest and largest historically black engineering schools in America. He served in this capacity until 2015.
Burge is currently the president and CEO of LL Burge and Associates, an international consulting firm with expertise in leadership, training and program management. LBA is a wholly minority-owned and operated firm which was conceived as a business entity in July 1999 by Burge and two of his children.
Burge has been recognized for his administrative leadership and research accomplishments throughout his career. He was elected to the American Society of Engineering Education Executive Board in 2005. For his contributions to his profession he was inducted into the OSU College of Engineering, Architecture and Technology Hall of Fame in 2017.
RELEASE CONTACT: Kylie Fanning | CEAT Marketing | 405-744-2745 | kyliecf@okstate.edu
Oklahoma State University is a modern land-grant university that prepares students for success. OSU has more than 35,000 students across its five-campus system and more than 24,000 on its combined Stillwater and Tulsa campuses, with students from all 50 states and around 120 nations. Established in 1890, Oklahoma State has graduated more than 240,000 students who have been serving the state of Oklahoma, the nation and the world.
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