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Engineering a Dramatic Profile-Enhancement
A rare female dean in her discipline, Toro-Ramos looks to tell the world about UNH engineering
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Business New Haven
3/3/2003
By: BNH
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Following a nationwide search, Zulma Toro-Ramos came to the University of New Haven in July 2001 to become dean of the School of Engineering & Applied Science, which has 700 undergrad and graduate engineering students. Trained as an industrial engineer who researched and worked on ergonomics and manufacturing systems, Toro-Ramos was previously chancellor of the University of Puerto Rico at Mayaguez, the only land-grant institution in the commonwealth and the only public institution in Puerto Rico that offers engineering education.
Before coming here what was your chief interest in the UNH position?
I saw a big challenge at UNH, because the institution had many good academic programs, but [they] were not very well known in the nation or in the state of Connecticut. My challenge was to get the programs better known and to increase the enrollment levels for the school of Engineering & Applied Science.
What disciplines does the engineering school cover?
We offer undergraduate education in all the major engineering fields, including mechanical, electrical, civil, chemical, computer science, general engineering and computer engineering.
We've heard a great deal in recent years about the shortages of engineers in the U.S. Is that true still today?
You have to plan for the long range. You can not only think about today and a year from today. Colleges of engineering have been graduating fewer engineers than they were 15 or 20 years ago. A good number of engineers that are currently employed by the state and federal governments and by industry are getting close to the age of retirement and will be retiring in the next four to seven years. Who will replace them if we are not producing enough in the colleges? There is an additional reason [for the shortage] in that we are not able to get high-school students interested in pursuing engineering-related careers. They are turned off very early in their high school, even in middle school, years.
Why isn't the role engineers play on the front lines of new technology generating more excitement in
the field?
Engineers are definitely behind the development of new technology, but many people use technology but don't necessarily care about how that technology was developed. Engineers are playing a key role in developing technologies and getting them to work. A lot of users don't really know where technology is coming from or how it is developed - and that is the problem. Many of the science teachers we have in high schools and middle schools are not really math and science teachers in that they don't have their degrees in those fields. They have been placed in those positions to teach because the schools don't have enough professionals from those areas to teach the courses.
You said that your school in Puerto Rico produced the most Latino engineers in the nation. Are Latinos on the mainland and other U.S. minorities going into engineering in representative numbers?
That is another problem. The Hispanic population in the U.S. is growing faster than other minority groups, but Hispanics have not been interested in engineering-related careers. The percentage of Hispanics we have enrolled [in engineering] is very small.
We met at 'Engineering Week.' What exactly is that?
It was established 50 years ago by the national Professional Engineering Society to create awareness of the profession and what engineering is all about. We address many topics that are very hot and related to the profession and expose the opportunities available.
Connecticut has a high concentration of engineers because of its aerospace companies and defense contractors. What impact has that had on the program?
We offer career-oriented programs that are developed so that graduates can find immediate work in industry. We don't offer programs for the research-related skills, but more the practice-oriented. That's in part because most of our students have some kind of working experience before graduation. Some are working and pursuing a degree simultaneously. If that's not the case we expect our students before graduation to have a limited experience in industry. We have undergraduate and graduate degrees. We have graduate degrees in all the programs I mentioned except chemical and general engineering.
Someone from United Technologies said there were about 1,000 UNH graduates working at UTC in Connecticut. What kind of relationships does the school have with companies, and what is the impact of smaller companies on the field?
We have relationships with many local companies. We have internships, where students will work on specific projects; we also have a co-op program. Students will work at the company for a semester or the full year and work on multiple projects. We also have advisory boards from different companies that help our faculty in keeping up to date to the needs of industry. At the dean's level I have an advisory board that advises on the strategic direction that we should pursue as an engineering school. Members are invited based on recommendations and nominations. We also work with small and emerging companies to provide them the expertise that they don't have in-house.
How is the demand for engineers overall, and what's hot?
We have more demand than ever for our graduates. Everyone here will have a job within two months after finishing a degree. Most of the emerging technologies are multi-disciplinary to start with. People from chemical, mechanical and electrical will have something to do with these emerging technologies such as fuel cells, nanotechnology, biotechnology. People that work in these areas are in high demand. Up to last fall we had a big demand for civil engineers; that could change in the near future because of state cutbacks.
Do you have a large number of engineering students from outside the U.S, and what impact might immigration policy have on enrollment?
Yes. We are seeing the effect in areas such as computer science. Engineering colleges are facing this challenge across the nation. A majority of the graduate students across the nation in engineering are from a foreign nation.
What role do engineers play in biotechnology?
Chemical and environmental engineers have a very important role to play. There are many things that are part of biotechnology, for example waste management. We have a good number of alumni at Bayer [pharmaceutical division]. We have an alliance with Bayer that includes some equipment donation to us, opportunities for internships, and collaboration in other areas as well.
U.S. News & World Report cited your chemical engineering program as one of the top five in the nation. What are your goals moving ahead?
Our goal is to be regional leader in engineering education in the next five years. In undergraduate education we are going to be offering a state-of-the-art program in the different engineering disciplines so our graduates will be able to work in all the emerging technologies. One of the difficulties is that engineers can work in their fields but can't interact effectively with engineers and professionals from other fields.
Are we going to see more engineering jobs move offshore because of shortages, or are U.S. colleges rising to the challenge?
I think the schools are definitely doing things to [compensate]. If we work hard to address the shortage we will have a better chance to keep our manufacturing jobs here. But there will be a lot of others things do be done as well. The engineering profession is not as difficult as people perceive it. An average person can get a degree in engineering; you don't have to be a genius. That message has to [be communicated] to everyone because we have to start there.
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