University Materials Council

University Materials Council

September 2004 Minutes

The Future of UMC
It was generally agreed that the primary role for UMC should be as a voice and advocate for Materials education. That, in addition to a forum for discussion of undergraduate and graduate issues in Materials Science, the group would become proactive and lead and become recognized by other government groups and professional societies as the source of information and knowledge on the current status and future of Materials Education. It was also agreed that this should be aggressively pursued. UMC should be the group that develops strategy and reports on issues related to Materials Education.

Issues related to the role of UMC as the Voice of Materials Education were:

Define future vision/identity for Materials Departments
Develop Curriculum of future
Define impact of globalization
Develop a focus for engineering with materials
Develop relationships with governmental bodies and professional societies to advance educational objectives

The UMC will approach various professional organizations such as TMS, NMAB, ASEE, ABET, MRS, etc after we have completed the tasks outlined below. The following tasks were the result of significant discussion and will be reported upon by the Task Forces at our next meeting.

Task Force #1
The first task force volunteered to develop a definition of a Materials Science and Engineering department that reflects current trends, globalization, and ABET (i.e., our role in defining design, etc as it pertains to MatSE) and to outline a strategy for the UMC to be a voice for Materials Education. Ian Robertson (chair), Raj Bordia, Dave Clark, Gary Messing, Grant Norton, John Rabolt, Bob Snyder

Task Force #2
Task force 2 will develop a response to the following question: What are the unifying features of our discipline. This group should develop a vision of the future that articulates an enduring identity for Materials. This task force will also look into the potential for rewriting the Flemings report on Materials from the 90’s. John Halloran (chair), Dave Clark, Peter Davies, Sungho Jin, Mark Plichta, Bob Snyder

Task Force #3
Task force #3 will develop a one page description of UMC for communicating with external agencies such as NMAB, funding agencies, and professional organizations. Alan Cramb (chair), Dave Clark, John Halloran, Alex King, Gary Messing, Peter Vorhees

Task Force #4
An outcome from the discussion was the need to develop a national CD for recruiting. A task force was created to outline what will be required to develop a national CD. Gary Messing (chair), Raj Bordia, Alex King, John Morrall, Steve Pilgrim, Mark Plichta. It was recommended that Gerry Liedl be involved. ABET – There was an emotional discussion about recent ABET actions, the burden of reporting, and ABET’s interpretation of DESIGN. It was decided UMC needs to give ABET a more flexible definition for Design as it pertains to Materials. Also, UMC needs to meet with the review board (TMS, MRS, ACerS) about this definition. We need to better understand how the reviewers are trained.

Task Force #5
Define design as it relates to MatSE programs. Review training procedures and documents used by ABET and suggest improvements. Develop a document that describes the Materials Science view of design that includes research projects in the final year. Ian Robertson (chair), Raj Bordia, Alan Cramb, Suriya Kalidindi. Next meeting to be in the Spring of 2005, in Washington, DC.