Penn State Intercom......December 5, 2002

Course pairs students with
businesses for hands-on learning

By Margaret Hopkins
School of Information Sciences and Technology

A team of five undergraduate students is wrestling with what, for some companies, is at least a $64,000 question: What kind of tool could identify and protect business-critical resources from natural and manmade disasters?

The assignment is more than an academic exercise for the five enrolled in IST 497C: IT Consulting and Project Management, a new course offered by the School of Information Sciences and Technology.

These students were asked by the IT department of Raytheon Co. to develop a disaster recovery plan for implementation at the national defense contractor's State College site. Should the students devise an assessment tool for reviewing recovery plans that could be commercially marketed across the industry, even better.

Offered for the first time this semester, IST 497C challenges students to solve IT projects of actual businesses and organizations. The student-consultants collaborate with companies to develop practical solutions to their pressing IT needs.

Students gain from the experience, and their "clients" benefit as well.

"It's definitely been a learning experience — we've had the opportunity to talk to experts, learn tangible consulting skills for future internships and jobs, and learn how to work as a team," said Dave Caruso, a junior from Pittsburgh.

Other benefits: Concepts taught in class take on more relevance, and students encounter issues outside the traditional textbook just as they would in the workplace, said Brian Cameron, an instructor in the School of Information Sciences and Technology, who designed the class.

This semester, Cameron has 36 students at work in several of Centre County's largest private employers and two groups partnering with the College of Education. As well as Raytheon, students have projects with AccuWeather Inc., C-COR.net and the Centre Daily Times.

Onsite visits and interviews are expected, as is a project plan that outlines the steps and milestones needed to complete the work. Students also must propose solutions that they present to the class and their clients.

For Ryan Fox, his team's project for national forecaster AccuWeather Inc. has demanded more than technical knowledge.

"We've had to take responsibility and show initiative," said the senior, one of five students involved in developing network monitoring for AccuWeather's Web servers. "I've had to figure out how to relate to the customer, too."

David Spangler, Fox's project leader, signed up for the class to gain that practical experience. As the only business major in IST 497C, Spangler has broadened his technical knowledge while his teammates have benefited from his business expertise.

"Working on a diversified team and being able to learn in a real-life example offers a lot of practical experience," Spangler said.

That positive buzz has translated to a class of 50 students signed up for the spring semester. While some of this fall's robust projects will continue into the spring, others will be new. The course will continue to evolve, Cameron said, as it responds to companies' needs and different models.

"I see students working with companies outside this county, students from other campuses working with companies in their area, and even collaboration between disciplines and campuses on some projects," Cameron said.

As with any new idea, there have been hitches, but Cameron sees such unexpected problems as a bonus in further challenging students.

"We had a lot of questions about what they wanted, and they needed us to ask those questions to better define the project," said Brian Loughlin, a senior IST major and project manager for the Raytheon disaster recovery project.

Even so, students and corporate sponsors agree the benefits have far outweighed any problems.

Parveen Shamsi, a junior in IST, has learned how to adapt to the language and time schedule of her group's client, the College of Education. Her team is creating a prototype of a Web-based assessment tool to evaluate prospective teachers' academic careers. The target users are education colleges and departments.

"They speak in a completely different language, and that's helped me step back and look at the whole project — not just the bits and bytes," Shamsi said. "We've had to shape the system to the users, so we build the right product, and not just for the technical aspects."

Businesses also see advantages. For one, projects that have been mothballed for lack of time or internal resources are taken off the shelf. Companies also gain from having an outsider's perspective on problems.

Said Jeff Jacoby, Raytheon Six Sigma expert, "There's benefit in mentoring and being a good corporate citizen."

Another plus: Students' opportunities to check out corporate cultures and management styles may help them focus their career goals. And companies get a head start on prospective interns and employees.

"There's been interest from some companies about employing some of the student-consultants this summer because they know the organization and can hit the ground running," Cameron said.

Margaret Hopkins can be reached at mah242@psu.edu.

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