Saluting our Schools

Challenging research opportunities at Jackson State

Grads and undergrads intern at organizations connected with the campus. Research projects focus on unmanned ground vehicles, robotics and vehicle controls

Jackson State University's engineering program was created in 2000 to make both undergraduate and graduate engineering education available to Mississippi's urban community. The first undergraduates got their degrees in May 2005 and the first grad degrees were awarded in May 2007.

"I don't think we've ever had a student who graduated and didn't get a job," says Dr Robert W. Whalin, professor and associate dean of the School of Engineering in the College of Science, Engineering and Technology. "Most have multiple job offers. It's a good time for engineers."

The undergraduate program accepted its first students in 2000, and the graduate program was launched in 2005. The new program immediately sought accreditation, which was awarded in 2007, retroactive to 2004. Early students had to have faith that the program would be successfully accredited.

"All our students graduated from an accredited program, but they didn't know it until the official letter arrived in August 2007," notes Whalin.

Working students are welcome
The school offers masters degrees in engineering with concentrations in civil, computational, computer, electrical, environmental, geological and telecommunications engineering. The computer science department offers an MSCS with specializations in cybersecurity, software engineering, wireless networks and high-performance computing.

Most students pursue fulltime programs, but the majority of graduate classes are scheduled in late afternoons and evenings to accommodate students who have fulltime jobs and engineers in the Jackson area who take courses to earn graduate degrees for professional advancement or to prepare for the professional engineer (PE) exam.

The location is a draw
Jackson State is designated by the state as the urban university of Mississippi. It's located in Jackson, the state capital and largest city with a metro population of more than 300,000. Forbes magazine ranks the city third out of America's top 100 bang-for-the-buck cities.

"If Mississippi has an urban area, this is it," says Whalin.

The program awards between twenty-five and thirty graduate degrees annually. Around seventy students are usually registered in the program. "It's not a huge number, but it's respectable for a small university," Whalin notes. Total university enrollment is about 9,000 students.

PE certification and advanced studies
All engineering students take the first step in earning PE certification by taking the Fundamentals of Engineering exam. Passing isn't required for graduation, but Whalin reports that students in the program have a reasonable pass rate.

About a quarter of Jackson State engineering grads continue on to PhD programs. Since 2007, Jackson State grads have gone to Texas A&M University, Washington University in St. Louis, the University of Illinois, Pennsylvania State University and Mississippi State. One graduate entered the PhD program at Georgia Tech and is working on unmanned aerial reconnaissance vehicles.

Research projects, internships and scholarships
Research projects with support of around $10 to $12 million annually provide challenging research opportunities for students. Most research is centered on Department of Defense and Department of Homeland Security projects for the Army, the Air Force and the Office of Naval Research. Projects focus on unmanned ground and aerial vehicles, robotics and vehicle control systems. Computational engineering projects research questions of fluid dynamics like the turbulence that follows airplanes.

The Northrop Grumman Center (NGC) for high-performance computing of ship systems engineering is located at the university in a 25,000 square foot facility on a thirty-acre research complex. The center gives students opportunities to work on development and application projects for next-generation Navy ships, using advanced high-performance computational assets, Whalin reports. NGC research also studies dispersion of contaminants in urban locations and on the battlefield and develops simulation technologies to study aerodynamic characteristics of future combat systems in the Army's modernization program. Director Shahrouz Aliabadi oversees the center's annual budget of about $2 million.

Jackson State is home to the Department of Homeland Security's coastal hazards center, Analysis and Response for Coastal Hazards (ARCH), one of its twelve centers of excellence. Center researchers study hurricanes, tsunamis and other issues related to the coast. Students can focus on coastal natural disaster preparation mitigation, response and recovery on both the undergraduate and graduate levels.

Nearly all undergraduates and graduates serve internships in one of the agencies or companies connected with the campus. Scholarships are available and many graduate students have teaching or research assistantships.

"We are pretty hands on," Whalin says. "All engineers are. We do things that work. Troops go out and use the systems we perform research on."

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