@article{df4300d030fc43cfaa83fa2042a601ca,
title = "Feeding Our Profession",
abstract = "The current status of power engineering and its future trends are discussed. Power engineering has taken a back seat in most of the electric engineering curricula with the advent of communication systems, information technologies and solid state electronics. There is a need of moving power engineering to high-tech programs that involve systems, new materials, applied mathematics and physics and integrated economic principles.",
author = "Heydt, {Gerald T.} and Vijay Vittal",
note = "Funding Information: remained fairly strong as industry infrastructure demands have been on the rise. In Mexico, economic growth and deregulation have helped the power industry, and many regional Mexican universities have excellent and well-attended graduate programs. Universities that have relatively large power programs (often more than five professors in the power subarea) have held their own in retaining power graduate enrollments, but real growth in enrollments among these programs is rare. Some of the information presented above is dated; however, this is the most recent data available in print. The authors have conducted an informal survey among colleagues at other universities and have noted the following. Over the past year, many universities that have a viable power program have seen significant increases in undergraduate enrollment in senior elective courses. At three large North American engineering schools, the increase in power engineering enrollments at the bachelor{\textquoteright}s level has been in the 30 to 50% range. This can be attributed to positive guidance from electric power utilities regarding the need for engineering manpower and, to some extent, the collapse of the job market in information technology (IT) and communications sectors. At schools that traditionally have had strong power programs, the graduate enrollment at both the master{\textquoteright}s and doctorate levels has remained steady. There are some particularly bright spots in the graduate picture. ✔ Several universities have active power affiliate pro-grams in which industry (mainly local) participates with the university to support graduate and undergradu-ate students. Industry-relevant topics are brought to the campus, and some hiring program is in effect. Some affiliate programs are quite old, having started with modern staffing and funding in the 1950s and 1960s. At Iowa State University, for example, an industry-funded program formed the base of the power program for at least 35 years. Contemporary affiliate programs often have some government funding. As an example, the Centre for Applied Power Electronics at University of Toronto, Canada, has some industry support, but the base support is from Canada{\textquoteright}s National Science and Engineering Research Council. The Power Systems National Key Laboratory at Tsinghua University, China, is fully supported by the government. In Europe, solid industrial support is often used as a base of power programs. For example, the Electric Power Systems Group at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stock-holm, Sweden, is supported by several European multi-national companies. Strong national industries often keep power alive at centers of excellence in Europe. ✔ Some power engineering educational programs have evolved on a larger scale, including multinational con-nections. An example is the National Electric Energy Testing, Research, and Applications Center (NEE-TRAC) at the Georgia Institute of Technology. The basic mission of such programs is to utilize the expert-ise of universities to provide a venue for precompetitive",
year = "2003",
month = jan,
doi = "10.1109/MPAE.2003.1180359",
language = "English (US)",
volume = "1",
pages = "38--45",
journal = "IEEE Power and Energy Magazine",
issn = "1540-7977",
publisher = "Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.",
number = "1",
}