Category Archives: Career

Information on jobs and careers in science and engineering.

Iowa Grapples with Engineer Shortage

“In the past four years or so, it’s become increasingly difficult to fill positions, especially for people who have experience and can come in with a good skill set,” Dougherty said. “In some instances, you simply go without filling those jobs for a long time.”

Loren Zachary, an assistant dean at the ISU College of Engineering, said enrollment has been mostly in a downward trend over the past six years. In 2001, the college had 1,556 new freshmen; in the fall of 2006, freshman enrollment was 1,213, which was up slightly from 2005’s enrollment of 1,155. Of the 800 or so students who graduate with a bachelor’s degree in engineering from ISU each year, more than 60 percent leave the state for employment, according to Hanneman’s figures.

“Certainly you have a lot of engineering students who are leaving the state,” said the IES’s Scott. “You’ll always have that because the universities attract many out-of-state students.” Zachary said ISU has only a small number of engineering students who are women or minorities. For the current academic year, 14.5 percent of undergraduate engineering students are female. These are two demographics the university is targeting to boost enrollment. “We need more females in engineering,” Zachary said. “It’s an untapped market for us.”

The article mentions several programs for primary and secondary school students we have mentioned previously: Project Lead the Way, Math Counts and FIRST LEGO League

Using IT to Improve Construction

Teicholz awarded top construction engineering prize:

One of CIFE’s biggest innovations is a program that visualizes the various stages of a construction project over time using 3-D models, like a digital movie. The models, which integrate hundreds of building components in an understandable way, can be shared early in the design stage and can straightforwardly communicate a complex schedule to everyone, Teicholz says. “Better decisions can be made about every aspect of the design rather than trying to improve the design after everyone has completed their work,” he says.

The need to correct mistakes after the fact is seen all too often in construction projects, says Martin Fischer, professor of civil and environmental engineering and current CIFE director. Walls built prematurely might have to be torn down, for example, or two work crews that did not communicate might plan to be in the same place at the same time. Time, labor and materials are wasted, and the final cost of the project increases.

Women Working in Science

Progress Over the Long Term

The commission found that women have doubled their share of bachelor’s degrees in science and engineering over the last four decades. In 1966, they earned one quarter (24.8 percent) of bachelor’s degrees in those fields, while in 2004, they earned half (50.4 percent). Over the same time span, women also gained a dramatically greater percentage of master’s degrees – 13.3 percent in 1966 versus 43.6 percent in 2004. At the doctorate level, the increase was especially noteworthy – 8 percent in 1966 compared to 37.4 percent in 2004.

Proportion of Females in the following fields, from the article:
Psychologists 67.3%
Biological Scientists 48.7%
Computer Programmers 26.0%
Chemical Engineers 14.3%
Mechanical Engineers 5.8%

Biomedical Engineering Opinion

An insight into biomedical engineering

Nevertheless, the strict regulatory procedures that must be adhered to in biomedical engineering can be frustrating and feel like a barrier to innovation, even though engineers in this field are often working at the leading edge of technology. Colin Hunsley says: “Anything new has to be shown to be better than what is currently available. A modern hip replacement, for example, is expected to last for 15 years or more; even with thorough testing via the formal clinical trials process, it can be hard to prove conclusively that a new development is significantly better.

The take-up of new products and techniques also depends to some extent on the way the market operates. In the UK, for instance, the National Health Service (NHS) funds most healthcare, whereas the USA market is driven by private medical insurance. With the budgeting structure of the NHS, it can be difficult to justify the adoption in one department of a more expensive treatment, even if it could lead to significant long-term savings for another department. This illustrates why it is important that biomedical engineers understand the market in which they operate.

Engineers – Changing Career Needs

Are US engineers up to the global challenge?

Does our existing pool of engineers have the skills for today’s jobs? “If technological change is moving faster, as most people claim, then the obsolescence cycles are probably getting shorter,” says Hira. Quoting William A. Wulf, president of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), Hira notes that the half-life of an engineer has gotten shorter. This means that continuing education is more critical for engineers than ever before. But the support mechanism of company subsidies has been largely dismantled because employees stay in jobs for shorter durations and companies no longer see benefit in paying tuition. It also means that companies, when they can, likely favor recent graduates over mid-career or older ones.

Educational Institutions Economic Impact

I believe investing in creating an environment where science and engineering endeavors will flourish will greatly benefit the economy. Some previous posts discussing these ideas include: Great Engineering Schools and Entrepreneurism, Engineering Future Economic Success, Science Research and the Economy and China’s Economic Science Experiment.

Wisconsin’s effort is hardly unique, but I grew up in Madison and my father taught Chemical Engineering, Statistics, and more at the UW so I pay attention to the efforts in Madison. The Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation has been one of the most successful attempts to take academic work and create successful business efforts to benefit the university, the professors and the economy overall. Their mission: “Moving inventions arising from the university’s laboratories to the marketplace for the benefit of the university, the inventors and society.”

Building Wisconsin’s Economy illustrates how the University of Wisconsin at Madison attempts to focus on creating economic benefit, which I think is a good idea. Economic benefit is not the only purpose, but it is worthy of focus.

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Engineering a Start-up

Engineering a start-up at University of California at San Diego:

Fifteen von Liebig-supported projects have been converted into startup companies. In the past two years alone, start-up companies that received von Liebig support have raised more than $10 million in capital. And even more discoveries have been licensed to telecommunications, biotechnology and other industry companies that are using the UCSD science to make new products or make their existing products better.

The center, started with a $10 million grant, has awarded a total of $2.4 million to 56 projects. An additional 25 projects have benefited from the center’s advisers. The return on investment has climbed steadily. The revenue UCSD received from the commercialization of discoveries out of the Jacobs School of Engineering has grown from $57,563 in 1999 to $602,713 in 2004, the most recent year for which figures were available.

Great stuff – this is the kind of thing that allows the ingenuity of engineers to benefit the economy and the engineers. Small focused efforts like this can have a huge long term impact, I believe. For those interested in building economic advantage through engineering education creating an entrepreneurial environment is a very important factor.

Scientists and Engineers Without Borders

Building on the Doctors without Borders organization are two organizations: Science without Borders and Engineers without Borders.

Science Without Borders:

Scientists may not provide emergency relief in times of disaster, but the discipline has a major role to play in meeting the chronic needs of our planet: health, agriculture, environment, energy, and many more. By creating Scientists Without Borders, the Academy aims to facilitate synergies among institutions already committed to the UN Millennium Development Goals as well as to unleash the energy of thousands of scientists in academia and industry. With the benefit of the best and most current information, they can apply their efforts to training health workers and researchers in developing countries or devote part of their research efforts to address underserved global challenges.

Engineers Without Borders (USA):

The activities of EWB-USA range from the construction of sustainable systems that developing communities can own and operate without external assistance, to empowering such communities by enhancing local, technical, managerial, and entrepreneurial skills. These projects are initiated by, and completed with, contributions from the host community working with our project teams.

Entrepreneurial Engineers

Business Leader Says Today’s Engineers Have to Be Entrepreneurial:

“Every engineer and scientist entering the job market today needs to be entrepreneurial, whether or not they plan to start their own business,” says Donna Novitsky, partner at venture capital firm Mohr Davidow Ventures and adjunct professor in the School of Engineering. “It’s no longer an optional job qualification. It’s a ticket to entry in leading companies, even for undergrads.”

Strong words. A great resource mentioned in the article Stanford Technology Ventures Program Educators Corner, includes a large number of podcasts and short (2 – 10 minute video webcasts):

Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP) Educators Corner is a free online archive of entrepreneurship resources for teaching and learning. The mission of the project is to support and encourage faculty around the world who teach entrepreneurship to future scientists and engineers, as well as those in management and other disciplines.

Video Game Designers Use Statistics

Here is another article on working in the gaming field – Statistically Speaking, It’s Probably a Good Game: Probability for Game Designers:

Being a designer in this day and age requires a pretty wide variety of skills. Designers are the generalists of the development team, needing to bridge the gap between Art and Engineering, competently communicating with each other.