Over the past year, the CEAS industrial engineering (IE) program has been innovatively transformed into a new undergraduate degree in Industrial and Entrepreneurial Engineering (IEE).
“The new IEE curriculum is fundamentally consistent with traditional IE programs with an added emphasis,” said Dr. Azim Houshyar, a professor in the IME department. “The new IEE curriculum emphasizes instruction in how to take a new concept from inception to introduction in the marketplace.”
In 2006 Houshyar and Dr. Bob White, another IME professor, began pulling together ideas to offset what Houshyar described as a “national problem” of decreasing demand for industrial engineers. “The problems of the economy and the changing perception of industrial engineers as quality or reliability engineers led us to study ways to blend engineering with business to reflect what our engineers are doing in the workplace.”
Houshyar and White teamed up with industrial engineering faculty that included Drs. Steven Butt, Tycho Fredericks, Leonard Lamberson, and Tarun Gupta to complete an extensive curriculum overhaul. Using input from the advisory board, faculty, and employers, they revised the traditional IE curriculum to create a new undergraduate degree in Industrial and Entrepreneurial Engineering (IEE) that is consistent with traditional IE programs.
The team focused on the goals and objectives of what the engineering students would need in the world of work. “Our graduates will fill a gap in current engineering education and will be best-fitted to the requirements of new global enterprises,” Houshyar said.
Curricular changes include three new capstone courses in entrepreneurial engineering. Entrepreneurial I, taught by White, focuses on the financial aspects. The second course is team taught by Butt, Fredericks, Houshyar, and White. It involves hands-on product design and development.
In a third course to be offered for the first time next year, Houshyar will focus on supply chain. “It will examine the marketing aspects such as how a product is marketed and where to find suppliers, manufacturers, and buyers,” he said. “The beauty of this is that our students are actually creating products that they will have to manufacture, price, and market.”
Part of the new IEE program requires students to choose from three foreign study options “They can actually do foreign study, participate in an internship, or take a course in globalization,” Houshyar said.
With the new IEE, students can also obtain a minor in any field. They are not limited to engineering.
Students who were enrolled in IE were allowed to graduate with an IE degree or to transfer into the new program. “The majority chose to transfer to the new program,” Houshyar said. “By next fall all our students will be in the IEE program.”
Future plans include a call for expanding the IEE program to the master’s level. A recent curricular change enables undergraduates to take up to 12 hours of 500level coursework that can be applied to both a bachelor’s and a master’s degree. It enables students to earn both in five years. It can be presently applied toward a master’s IE degree and in the future to one in IEE.
For more information on the IEE program, email azim.houshyar@wmich.edu or bob.white@wmich.edu
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