Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering, Iowa State University, Ames, IA

The Department of Industrial & Manufacturing Systems Engineering aims to produce graduates that are functionally relevant and have the necessary skills to compete successfully as engineers in the 21^st century. To achieve this, the department has to be industrially relevant, understand future trends in engineering education, and be proactive in making changes to the program to meet the present and future market expectations. We constantly monitor our course offerings and introduce changes to strengthen the program as we gain new insights.

During the 1997/98 and 1998/99 academic years, the department went through a curriculum revision exercise that was guided by a set of questions:

Answers to the above questions combined with the college and ABET program criteria were used to design a new industrial engineering program of which the department is proud.

Specific program changes and improvements that resulted from the exercise included some of the following:

Further references on some of the above changes are provided throughout the remainder of this document. The program has seen many changes within the past six years since the last ABET visit. This level of changes is anticipated given the rapid market and technological changes taking place globally:

During the last ABET visit in 1994, the department had an Interim Chair, Dr. Geraldine Montag. Since then, Dr. Pius Egbelu has been hired as the permanent Chair for the department. Dr. Egbelu joined the department in spring, 1996. Before joining Iowa State University, he had held faculty positions in industrial engineering at Syracuse University and Pennsylvania State University. He also served as a Program Director for the Production Systems and Operations Research Programs at the National Science Foundation in Arlington, Virginia. He holds a B.S., M.S. and a Ph.D. in industrial engineering and operations research and is a Fellow of the Institute of Industrial Engineers (IIE). He is an established researcher and educator. Therefore, the department considered his recruitment as a Department Chair to be a good match for the department needs.

Dr. Egbelu has accepted an appointment as Dean of Engineering at Louisiana State University, effective July 1, 2000. We hope to continue the department’s improvement begun under Dr. Egbelu’s tenure as we search for his replacement.

Several new faculty members have been recruited since the last ABET visit. The new hires have been targeted to cover strategic areas of the department’s educational and research objectives. These new hires are very qualified and have graduated from some of the premier universities in the country. A brief introduction of each these new hires is provided below.

Dr. Frank Peters received his Ph.D. in industrial engineering, with a minor in Materials Science, from Pennsylvania State University. He joined the department as an Assistant Professor in the summer of 1996. His primary teaching and research interests are in manufacturing processes, especially welding and casting, and manufacturing systems.

Dr. Ranga Narayanaswami received his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. He joined the department in fall, 1997 as an Assistant Professor. Dr. Narayanaswami's teaching and research interests are in computer-aided design and graphics, virtual reality, process planning, flexible manufacturing systems and manufacturing automation.

Dr. Timothy Van Voorhis is an Assistant Professor and received his Ph.D. in industrial engineering from Georgia Institute of Technology. He has been with the department since fall, 1997. His teaching and research interests are operations research, focusing on mathematical optimization.

Dr. Sigurdur Olafsson joined the department as an Assistant Professor in fall, 1998 following the completion of his Ph.D. program in industrial engineering at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. His primary teaching and research interests are in simulation, analysis of stochastic manufacturing systems, and simulation-based optimization.

Dr. Shaochen Chen received his Ph.D. in 1999, in mechanical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. He joined the department in summer 1999 as an Assistant Professor following the completion of his graduate work. Dr. Chen teaches courses in manufacturing processes and conducts research in micromachning, nano-manufacturing, Micro-Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS), and ultra-short laser micromachining.

Dr. Sarah Ryan joined the department as an Associate Professor in fall 1999. Before joining Iowa State University, she had served on the industrial engineering faculty at the University of Pittsburgh and the University of Nebraska. She is a graduate of the University of Michigan where she received her Ph.D. in 1988. Dr. Ryan’s teaching and research interests are in operations research and with emphasis on stochastic modeling and dynamic optimization.

Dr. Max Morris joined the department fall 1998 as a full Professor with joint appointment with the Department of Statistics. Dr. Morris received his Ph.D. in statistics from Virginia Polytechnic and State University in 1979. Before joining Iowa State University, he held faculty positions at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center in San Antonio and Mississippi State University, and was a Senior Research Scientist and Statistics Group Leader at Oak Ridge National Laboratory. His teaching and research interests include experimental design, spatial sampling and modeling, change detection techniques, and the design and analysis of computer experiments.

IMSE Department has gone through a major restructuring of its curriculum to (1) provide the students the skills they would need to be effective engineers in the 21^st century, and (2) to respond to the need of a changing technological world. Through the curriculum restructuring process, other essential areas of skills were identified and incorporated into the curriculum. The new curriculum now includes interest tracks. The number of credits required for graduation was reduced from 138 semester hours to 123.5 hours. The new curriculum broadens the opportunities available to our students while at the same time it is more responsive to employers and the changing technological world.

A learning community is a group of students who are either in a common university residence, enrolled in common sections of the same course, and/or participating in mentoring, peer advising or faculty interaction modules. Learning communities are structured by discipline or by area of interest. Most learning communities are developed for the first two semesters of the freshman year, although some departments have expanded their communities into the sophomore year. At Iowa State University advisers for curricula with learning communities invite new freshmen during summer orientation to join the learning community. During the Fall Semester 2000, learning communities will be offered for six engineering degree programs: agricultural engineering, chemical engineering, computer engineering, electrical engineering, industrial engineering, and mechanical engineering. Other learning communities are also available for engineering students who have not yet chosen a major, or who are minority students, women in science or engineering majors, or interested in a learning community with an international flavor.

The college assists engineering departments in developing and processing the learning community applications. A college committee, comprised of the program coordinators from each department, work together to develop shared student activities–such as retreats–to strengthen the bond of the students with each other and the faculty and staff involved in the learning community. The learning community program in IMSE is now three years old, and is providing a positive learning environment for our entering students.

Before November 1999, IMSE Department was housed in Engineering Annex. Today, the department is housed in Black Engineering Building and shares the building with the Mechanical Engineering Department. In addition to the facilities in Black, the department also has laboratory and graduate students’ space in Sweeney Hall. However, the majority of the department’s laboratories are housed in Black. Black Engineering is a more modern building and therefore offers more quality space compared to the space we had in Engineering Annex. Therefore, all the office and laboratory spaces now owned by the department have been acquired after the last ABET visit. The relocation has made it possible to reorganize our offices and laboratories in a way that improves their overall contributions to the department’s educational and research goals. Furthermore, the move to Black has also made it possible to co-share laboratory facilities with Mechanical Engineering Department. The co-sharing of some laboratories has broadened the number of laboratory facilities and equipment available to the department.

IMSE has a strong laboratory tradition to supplement classroom instructions. We believe in engineering education that combines sound theoretical understanding with practical training. IMSE continues to pursue this laboratory tradition and has developed several new labs since the last ABET visit. New teaching laboratories established since the last ABET visit include the following:

The missions of these new laboratories are provided in Section B6. The descriptions of the laboratories also highlight the resources in them.

At the college level a strong K-12 recruitment and outreach program, with three full-time staff members and over 100 volunteers, works with students and teachers to insure high quality incoming students. The college also partners with other offices across the institution, such as Minority Student Affairs and the Program for Women in Science and Engineering. Examples of programs for K-12 students and faculty include:

The department participates in the above activities; in addition we have two activities specific to our department:

Furthermore, the department maintains an active Recruiting and Retention Committee composed of the faculty, staff, and students. The department also has on its staff three half-time interns to support and promote the department’s recruiting efforts. The interns work with the Recruiting and Retention Committee and a host of IMSE students to represent and market the department at recruiting events.

All programs are regularly reviewed to determine program effectiveness. Programs are modified, added, or eliminated based on the results of the reviews. A variety of external and internal advisory boards also provide guidance for program direction. The development of techniques for assessing the effectiveness of these recruitment programs is currently underway, and will be used during the Fall 2000 semester.

B.0.7 New Staff

To improve the services we provide our constituencies, the department in the past four years has added to its office and support staff. The following are the new staff additions:

Deb Holmes is the Academic Advisor for undergraduate students. She also coordinates the department’s learning communities.

Kevin Brownfield is a Senior Machinist. He is a vital part of the student’s experience in the manufacturing processes laboratories, and also provides technical services to our research and technical efforts.

Kim Vo is an Administrative Specialist. She handles the department’s budget and financial matters.

Lois Miller is a half time Secretary I. She is a member of the office staff.

These new staff additions are further evidence of the college and the department’s continued commitment to become a first rate industrial engineering department that is competitive in all aspects of its operations.

B.0.8 Development of New Committees

Since the last ABET visit, several changes have been made in the organization of the committees in the department. This was done to improve the services we provide to our constituencies and respond in an agile fashion to an ever-changing educational environment. The key changes made are itemized below.

Alumni Relations Committee was changed to Alumni Relations and Special Events Committee
Curriculum Committee was changed to Curriculum, Assessment and Standards Committee
Extension Advisory Committee was changed to Outreach and Distance Education Committee
Recruiting and Retention Committee was created
Research Committee was created
Teaching Improvement Committee was created
Undergraduate and Graduate Seminar Planning and Coordinating Committee was created
Space Planning Committee was created

B.0.9 Development of Department Web Site

The department fully embraces the Internet as a medium for sharing information about the department to people around the world regardless of where they are located. Because of the role the Internet plays in assisting the department to fulfill its mission, the department maintains an active web site with several levels. Working under the supervision of a faculty member, two students provide services to the department to develop the web site and maintain the currency of its contents. This maintenance role also involves the redesign of the site as needed to meet changing requirements for information dissemination.