David Brule’s Legacy of Supporting Students and Community
Michigan Tech alumnus to deliver far more than twenty pre-college or university college students with full scholarships to
the University’s Summer season Youth Courses.
Most of David Brule’s philanthropic contributions about the several years have no formal file
or push. With far more than forty several years in organization and hundreds of workers, Brule ’72
has observed and listened to of hardships. No matter if an personnel in require of a new furnace, a unexpected
sickness involving a young kid or a tragedy this kind of as a household fireplace, Brule has usually been determined to enable.
Brule’s legacy of providing was first cultivated in the course of his time as a organization chief
in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (UP). Born, lifted and schooled in the UP, Brule has
deep gratitude for the region’s people and prospects. Right after a quick stint at Northern
Michigan University and a flavor of a profession as a lineman, in 1969 Brule transferred
his spark for all points electric north, to Michigan Technological University. Older
and a “little wiser,” Brule stated he felt fully commited to the arduous academic experience
Michigan Tech presented. In this article, his aptitude for analytical imagining was refined.
Delivering Possibilities
Brule has lengthy supported Michigan Tech and its outreach arm, Summer season Youth Courses
(SYP), and this year, his providing retains new opportunities for middle schoolers at Bothwell
Center College in Marquette, Michigan. Alongside one another with his wife Thu, Brule will fund
full-journey scholarships for far more than twenty pre-college or university college students to experience the weeklong
STEM explorations held on Tech’s campus in Houghton.
“Legitimate priorities have to consider location in a relatives, and sometimes — often — that
won’t permit experiences this kind of as these,” Brule stated. “SYP is so a great deal far more than a camp
— it’s a lifestyle-altering experience to be in an academic natural environment, challenged by
science. Their lifestyle expands in that limited week.”
Brule also has a vested fascination in the Michigan Tech Higher education of Organization, courting
back again to 2006 when he served launch the Master of Organization Administration (MBA) software.
In 2019, a new $fifty,000 donation produced on the Day of Giving (April eleven) goes directly
to college student scholarships.
“My fascination in organization stems from my individual experiences in the working earth. Tech’s
organization software synergistically blends organization with engineering, and as I experienced,
that is critical in today’s natural environment,” he stated.
Engineering a Flourishing Organization
An electrical engineer by coaching, after a few several years of arms-on engineering, Brule’s
profession pivoted toward the leadership ranks when he set up a new division for
northern Michigan-centered M.J. Electric in 1975. By 1978 he was a vice president and
by 1992 he bought a the vast majority stake in the corporation, which would go on to spawn Manager
Snowplow, a single of North America’s major companies of snow and ice regulate machines,
and Devices Regulate, the major regulate and relay panel company in the country.
Brule credits his Tech-honed analytical means and publicity to STEM for his formidable
accomplishment in organization.
His fondness for this land is rooted in its tricky-working, reliable people. The Northwoods
Ethic, a phrase Brule penned lengthy back, is to this working day etched in the partitions of his former
workplace: Difficult working. Integrity. Honesty. Traits embodied by “Yoopers.”
“I usually credit rating my achievements in organization to my workers. Everyone can have an idea,
but you require committed, hardworking people to provide it to lifestyle,” Brule stated.
Placing Persons Very first
All through his profession, Brule produced supporting people a precedence. “Education is the great
leveler in culture,” Brule stated. “When young people have chance, accomplishment follows.”
His devotion to enable has led him to Nepal, India, Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, Sri Lanka,
Bangladesh, Zambia and South Africa, in which through the nonprofit Place to Browse, he supported
making new universities and libraries, and sponsored scholarships so young women could
go after an schooling.

people’s lives.
Nearer to household, Brule has held a deep fascination in and a lengthy-standing partnership
with the Specific Olympics every single year he and his corporation planned a bowling celebration for
hundreds of Special Olympic athletes. “Working with them was an very fulfilling
experience. At the stop of the working day we had been physically exhausted, but spiritually revived.
There is so a great deal joy in anything as simple as bowling with each other.”
Creating an Speedy Affect
Retired due to the fact 2018, Brule a short while ago married Thu and the few have immersed them selves
in jobs that make a distinction in the lives of young people and families. This
tumble, they had been publicly lauded for their assist of the YMCA department in Marquette,
Michigan.
“Thu and I are normal buyers, and the facility serves far more than 5,000 community customers
— it’s critical for the bodily and mental health of the community,” Brule stated.
“A million very little miracles happen each individual solitary working day in these businesses, which are
unfortunately usually underfunded.”
Typically, it is not the couple’s type to give in a general public way. But Brule says
they have arrive to realize that communities — especially restricted-knit, remote UP cities
— require philanthropic leaders providing requires to be obvious to encourage far more people to
do so.
“Dave and Thu are people of action,” stated Dean Johnson, dean of the Michigan Tech
Higher education of Organization. “It’s inspiring to perform alongside donors this kind of as them mainly because
with each other we can directly and quickly affect long run Michigan Tech college students.”
The Brules hope by investing in young people, far more will have the chance to graduate
and stay or return to the Upper Peninsula. “Dreams can become truth, and that process
starts with a great schooling. Thu and I don’t just give — we anticipate a return, it’s
just that the return doesn’t arrive to us. It goes to people we enable. It is never ever a handout,
it’s usually a hand up.”
Michigan Technological University is a general public research university, household to far more than
7,000 college students from fifty four nations around the world. Launched in 1885, the University delivers far more than
a hundred and twenty undergraduate and graduate degree packages in science and engineering, engineering,
forestry, organization and economics, health professions, humanities, arithmetic, and
social sciences. Our campus in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula overlooks the Keweenaw Waterway
and is just a few miles from Lake Superior.