In Brief
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New concentration to help engineers improve health care system
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A new graduate concentration will help NC State engineers improve the nation’s growing health care system.
The concentration in health systems engineering was among the new initiatives the Edward P. Fitts Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering set out to install after Fitts, a 1961 graduate of the department, made his landmark $10 million gift in 2005. Students should be able to start taking courses in the concentration this fall.
Dr. Stephen Roberts, a professor in the department who directs NC State’s Laboratory for Healthcare Systems Engineering, said the concentration’s curriculum and research will likely focus on health delivery systems, particularly in the field of disease management. Two new faculty members have been hired to build the program, and the department has received several grants, including a $1.6 million award from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that will fund systems engineering research to improve the North Carolina Health Alert Network.
“Health care delivery was once considered to be outside engineering practice, but we hope to change that,” Roberts said. “Engineers have no clear role in delivering health care right now, but we believe they must be a part of the deliberations about health care delivery, so that decision and policy makers are better informed.”
College develops mission, vision
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The College has developed new mission and vision statements to shape its activities in the 21st century. The statements were developed by a committee of College leaders with input from faculty and staff.
The vision statement sees the College becoming “the leading public college of engineering in the nation and one of the preeminent colleges of engineering in the world.” The College will achieve this goal through research, education, economic development, partnerships and building on its own reputation, among other activities.
The mission statement says the College “leads discovery, learning and innovation by creating and disseminating knowledge, empowering significant advances in technology, and driving economic development for the welfare of the state, the nation and the world.”
The mission is guided by core values and guiding principles that include providing equal educational opportunities for all, insisting on ethical behavior, focusing on students in all activities and valuing leadership, discovery and an open exchange of ideas.