The Many Shapes of Sabbaticals
Pitt engineering professors share their experiences of taking sabbaticals at home in Pittsburgh
This story is the last in a three-part series that explores the benefits and challenges of sabbaticals. The first article shares stories of the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering professors who took sabbaticals overseas, and the second explored sabbaticals taken across the United States. This article turns to two professors who stayed in Pittsburgh.
Like all the stories in this series, these reflections highlight the varied and profoundly rewarding experiences professors have had, no matter where their sabbaticals took them.
Sabbaticals come in many shapes and sizes. Some involve crossing oceans and cultures, others U.S. states and institutions. Yet leaving one’s home and family can be impractical if not impossible. And leaving home isn’t the only way to immerse oneself in new research, develop educational plans, form new collaborations, and shore up existing ones.
The stories below attest to that fact. While professors who remained in Pittsburgh may have felt the pull of their labs, graduate students, and service obligations, they still had the much-needed time and space that took them in new directions. Their experiences highlight that intention, planning, flexibility, and curiosity – not travel – are the essential ingredients to a productive, inspiring, even life-changing sabbatical.
“I needed the chance to take a deep dive.”
Ready to redirect his research, Daniel Cole, associate professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science and Director of Pitt’s Cyber Energy Center, finally took a sabbatical 17 years after he started a Pitt.
“It was simply time,” Cole said. “Not enough people take sabbaticals.”
Cole partnered with the Idaho National Lab (INL), working closely with chief cybersecurity scientist Greg Shannon. With funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, he spent a year exploring how formal methods, a mathematical approach used to test complex systems, could be applied to controls, safety, and security of critical infrastructure.
The partnership, which INL profiled, provided Cole an opportunity that he missed. “Too often as professors, we’re managing research. Now I could explore new ideas, try things, ask ‘what if,’ and write. I read a lot, learned new coding languages, and struggled in ways I never would have under normal day-to-day responsibilities.”
While Cole wishes he could have spent his sabbatical in Idaho, he was glad he took a full year. “The separation is valuable. Ideally, you go somewhere, have an experience, and bring it back to Pitt to make it better.”
He may have stayed home, but he still brought something important to Pitt, the Swanson School, and the Cyber Energy Center.
In addition to building connections with a national lab and its researchers, Cole said, “I brought back technologies and approaches related to rigorous digital engineering, which help ensure safety and security for critical infrastructure.”
“It’s easy to lose those connections.”
Julie Vandenbossche, professor of civil and environmental engineering and the department’s Associate Chair of Research, also stayed in Pittsburgh for her recent sabbatical. But this didn’t hinder her ability to connect with collaborators across the country and pursue new research.
“Balancing teaching, service, and research makes it challenging to expand into new areas, search for new funding opportunities, and build the background and connections needed to move work forward,” said Vandenbossche, who researches concrete pavements and cementitious materials.
During her sabbatical, she explored cement chemistry, particularly in relation to low-carbon concrete. “I explored different materials being used, met with manufacturers that produce alternative materials, and became more familiar with the manufacturing process.”
Vandenbossche is building collaborations as well, connecting with researchers at the University of California Davis and with the National Road Research Alliance. She reconnected with collaborators here in Pittsburgh and visited peers around the country, with a side trip to Alaska.
Remaining in Pittsburgh was not without its drawbacks. She was pulled toward the University and obligations there in a way that distance might have helped limit. Yet the time for reflection proved invaluable. “From a research perspective, I thought about where I want to go over the next five years and how to move forward in that direction.”
“It extended well beyond four months.”
Aaron Batista, professor of bioengineering, waited 17 years before taking his first sabbatical, and when he did, he knew he would stay close to home.
“I have young children and a long-established lab, and leaving town was unrealistic,” said Batista, who researches neuroscience and neural engineering.
As for why he was ready for a sabbatical, Batista added, “I was starting to feel a little too narrowly focused on what I was doing in my own lab, and I wanted to get a sense for what else was happening around me.”
That changed last year after he observed a neurosurgical procedure conducted by his colleague Jorge Gonzalez-Martinez, in the School of Medicine Neurological Surgery.
“The first time I walked into an operating room, I was struck by how complex and coordinated everything was,” Batista said. “Neurosurgery is deeply collaborative.
“That first day clarified my sabbatical plan, and I began spending two days a week observing neurosurgeries. These experiences reshaped how I think about bioengineering and the role it can play in patient care.”
Batista began collaborating closely with Gonzalez-Martinez, exploring how engineering approaches could improve surgical procedures and expand treatments. “Our conversations went far beyond the operating room. We talked about better electrodes, faster procedures, and expanding the diseases a surgeon could treat.”
From the collaboration has come a National Institute of Health T32 grant that, if funded, will train engineers to work alongside clinicians during neurosurgical procedures and identify opportunities to expand treatment options and improve outcomes. The grant will expand the Department of Bioengineering’s scope with the new focus on neuroengineering and neuroscience.
“Sabbaticals don’t have to involve international travel or leaving campus entirely,” Batista said. “Mine was local, structured, and manageable, with minimal disruption to my lab and teaching responsibilities. The return on that investment was enormous: renewed energy, new collaborations, and a clearer sense of purpose.”
Like so many Pitt engineers who have taken sabbaticals, his experience reflects that it doesn’t matter how far one travels, but how significantly one is changed. Echoing many of his colleagues, Batista said, “Looking back now, this was one of the most meaningful periods of my career.”
