collaboration in Information Technologies
Published Monday, February 13, 2012 6:07 am
By Douglas C. Schmidt Fortunately, there is strong, but under-developed potential for synergy among Nashville's academic and scientific communities and industry. The vital ingredient: Broader, deeper collaboration among local universities and companies. There is broad consensus on this point, and some initiatives are already underway. ► Join faculty in guiding "capstone" student design projects, in which graduating seniors create and execute software-intensive projects for external clients. Industry mentors help students analyze problems, plan software development, produce robust solutions, and then evaluate their work.
► Work with student-led IT organizations, such as the Vanderbilt Mobile Applications Team (VMAT). VMAT is helping Nashville retain a vital pool of talented developers who focus on mobile, Web and social-media presence. Many VMAT alumni have formed/joined local high-tech startups.
► Partner with such research institutes as the Institute for Software Integrated Systems (ISIS), based in the Vanderbilt University's School of Engineering. It focuses on systems with deeply integrated software that are networked, embedded, and cyber-physical. ISIS routinely works with faculty at UC Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell, Harvard, MIT, Stanford and others; and, with Boeing, GM, Lockheed-Martin, Siemens, Microsoft Research and other leading companies.
Believe me, these three ideas merely scratch the surface of potential collaborations among Nashville companies, universities, and scientific communities. For our part, Vanderbilt's School of Engineering looks forward to further collaboration with industry and universities, here in our hometown.
Contact Douglas C. Schmidt: schmidt@dre.vanderbilt.edu ______________ Proposed contributions for IDEAS are welcomed and should be directed to Milt Capps, Editor & Publisher, via milt at venturenashville.com Thanks.
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