The LearningWell Coalition is pleased to welcome a new STEM-focused university being established in Bentonville, Arkansas as its newest member. This entirely new institution with a build-centered, industry-embedded studio model meant to prepare students for both technical careers and lifelong flourishing, joins the Coalition while still in its founding stages.

The STEM-focused university is being built from scratch to integrate STEM, business, human-centered design, and lifelong learning within an agile, studio-based environment. Rather than organizing education around lectures and disciplinary silos, the university will center learning on creating, testing, building, and improving real solutions to real problems, developing what its founders call “systems builders” who combine technical depth, entrepreneurial thinking, and strong communication skills.

At the heart of this model is sustained collaboration between students and faculty mentors, entrepreneurs, industry leaders, and community partners. Students will work in multidisciplinary teams on projects, paired with internships and apprenticeships that connect coursework directly to societal contribution. The university’s founders describe faculty as serving not only as instructors, but as mentors and collaborators invested in students’ identity, resilience, and sense of purpose alongside their technical growth.

A flexible, stackable curriculum is being designed to let students enter, exit, and return to their education as their goals evolve, reflecting the future university’s commitment to lifelong learning as a structural feature of the institution rather than an add-on program. As it moves through its design phase, assessment planning is already underway to measure purpose, belonging, agency, and mentoring quality alongside more traditional academic outcomes.

“We believe that lifelong wellbeing is not an ancillary outcome of education; it is central to the purpose of a university,” said David W. Mazyck, Ph.D., Founding President of the future STEM-focused university. “Students flourish when they are challenged to build meaningful solutions, supported by strong mentoring relationships, connected to authentic communities of practice, and given opportunities to contribute to something larger than themselves.”

As a member of the LearningWell Coalition, the future STEM-focused university will contribute to and learn from a national network of institutions advancing evidence-based, learner-centered approaches to student flourishing, an opportunity the university’s founders see as especially valuable while its educational model, metrics, and milestones are still taking shape.

“This future STEM university represents a rare opportunity to build wellbeing, purpose, and belonging into the DNA of an institution from day one,” said Angela Lindner, Executive Director of the LearningWell Coalition. “We’re glad to help shape that work as it happens, and we look forward to what the Coalition can learn from an institution designing itself, from the ground up, around student flourishing.”

About STEM-Focused University
In 2025, Steuart Walton and Tom Walton announced their vision to reimagine STEM education for the next generation of innovators, builders, and entrepreneurs through founding a STEM-focused university in their hometown of Bentonville, Arkansas. Multiple members of the Walton family are supporting this vision, including Alice Walton through the Alice L. Walton Foundation.

The non-profit, business-infused university will embed artificial intelligence across its academic programs, teaching methods, and institutional operations to help students create real-world value. It’s envisioned as a catalyst for regional talent, economic mobility, and long-term growth, strengthening Northwest Arkansas while shaping a national model for what STEM education can become.

About the LearningWell Coalition
The LearningWell Coalition is a growing network of colleges and universities in the United States and internationally dedicated to advancing higher education to ensure every student is prepared to flourish in work and in life. The Coalition brings together institutions committed to implementing evidence-based, learner-centered practices that support students’ sense of purpose, belonging, agency, character, and identity—capacities essential for long-term wellbeing and meaningful engagement in work and civic life.