The Professional Science Master’s (Psm) Degree In Engineering Technology

The Professional Science Master’s (PSM) Degree in Engineering Technology (ET) is a new degree option created to meet growing industry needs for technologists with broad background and experience to provide rewarding career and academic opportunities for undergraduates in science, technology, business and health majors. According to the Council of Graduate Schools (CGS), this program involves not only advanced disciplinary study in engineering and technology, but also an appropriate array of professional skill-development activities to produce graduates highly valued by employers and fully prepared to progress toward leadership roles. These additional interdisciplinary professional skills include legal, communication, marketing, finance, and business training which are in demand by industry to complement the students’ engineering technology expertise. The nontechnical courses are often developed in collaboration with appropriate academic departments outside engineering technologies and are often taught by qualified adjunct faculty from the appropriate areas of industry. The main objective of this proposed program is to graduate high caliber technologists with multiple talents who can effectively participate and directly contribute to the improvement of the U.S. industrial competitiveness in the current global economy. This paper portrays an actual program model that describes the method of tailoring this new master’s degree program to respond to current industrial needs, both locally and nationally.