Teaching A Web Based Graduate Course On Taguchi Methods

S. Balachandran, University of Wisconsin-Platteville Dr. S. Balachandran is a Prof. of Ind. Eng., at UW-Platteville. He owns the consulting firm Process Improvement and has served as a consultant to manufacturing companies, businesses, law firms and government agencies. His areas of interest are ergonomics, continuous process and quality improvement, design of experiments, facilities design, manufacturing system design and simulation. He received B.E. Degree with Honors in Mech. Eng. from the University of Madras, India in 1968, and received M.E. degree with Distinction in Aeronautical Eng. with specialization in rockets and missiles from the Indian Institute of Science, India in 1970. He worked as Project Engineer at the Indian Space Research Organization, India from 1970 to 1974 and worked at Va. Tech. as Research Assistant, Instructor and Asst. Prof. from 1975 to 1985. He received Ph.D. degree in I.E. & O.R. from Va. Tech. in 1984. He worked as Assoc. Prof., Professor and Chairman of Industrial Engineering at UW Platteville from 1985 to 1994. He worked as a manufacturing engineering consultant at John Deere Dubuque Works, Dubuque, IA from 1996 to 2001, developed simulation models to design manufacturing systems, and provided more than 6000hours of assistance in ergonomics, quality engineering, and simulation. Since 1994 he has been serving as expert witness in product liability cases. He has over 170 presentations and publications. He continues to serve as a technical reviewer for the IJPR, IJPPC, and IJSM. He is as an ABET/TAC Commissioner and IIE/ABET program evaluator for industrial engineering, engineering management, and industrial technology programs. He is a member of IIE, ASEE, INFORMS, SME, ASQ, APICS and HF&ES. He is listed in several Who's Who publications. He is Vice President of Region IV of the IE Honor Society Alpha Pi Mu. He is involved in a few civic organizations and performs volunteer service activities in Madison, WI.