Dean Egerstedt: The Future of Engineering Education

An engineering student networks at a UCI-sponsored industry event

Jan. 8, 2024 – The future of engineering education is not necessarily found in the classroom, but in the lab and in industry. At least, that’s what’s happening at UC Irvine.  “We want to graduate great engineers who are ready for the job on day one,” says Magnus Egerstedt, dean of the UCI Samueli School of Engineering.  Egerstedt was speaking on “Engineering Education in the 21st Century” at a recent conference for the Advanced Casting Research Center (ACRC), the largest industry-academia alliance focused on metal processing research in North America. 

UCI’s new program Engineering+ Practicum launches students into full-time paid positions in industry while they’re students. “It’s an internship on steroids,” Dean Egerstedt says. The school is partnered with over 20 companies that employ students for at least six months while UCI gives them the option of receiving credits for the Practicum course.  It’s a great way for the students to gain valuable work experience and priceless networking opportunities. Partners include a wide spectrum of industry leaders, including NASA, Apple, SpaceX, Alcon, Blue Origin, Edwards Lifesciences, Northrop Grumman, SoCal Edison and many more.

“UCI is an effective laboratory because we are still relatively young,” said Dean Egerstedt as the university approaches its 60th anniversary in 2025. Since becoming dean in July 2021, he has focused on enriching student experiences outside the classroom and calls this approach “Engineering Plus.”  

Dean Magnus Egerstedt with Peter the Anteater on campus

To help them succeed in their future careers, the school offers an Essential Skills course that trains students in communication, storytelling, career planning, entrepreneurship, and more. There’s no better entrepreneur to do so than Distinguished Professor Diran Apelian, the co-founder of the billion-dollar company Ascend Elements, one of TIME magazine’s America’s Top Ten Green Tech Companies of 2024. Apelian’s new class has become very popular as he shares many insightful lessons and brings in industry leaders as guest lecturers that share how to excel in the real world.

The school also offers multidisciplinary certificates, such as the Environmental Changemakers, to students who’ve taken courses across UCI schools that give them deeper knowledge around a key theme. These certificates fit the new bill of why many young people are choosing engineering. “Students are increasingly mission-driven,” said Egerstedt. “They see engineering as a tool to solve a problem they care about such as climate change.

Beyond the classroom, there are countless projects and clubs that propel careers. Sky Hargrove ’23 was project manager for the UCI Rocket Project when it was one of the few undergraduate teams in the nation to launch a methalox rocket in 2023. That experience launched her career as a rocket test engineer at Blue Origin in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.   “There are so many great experiences I had during the project that definitely shaped who I am,” Hargrove said. “A lot of the design reviews and high stress, high stakes situations I encountered on the project have definitely helped train me for the now larger scale tests in industry.”

Sky Hargrove ’23 began work as a rocket test engineer at Blue Origin after leading the UCI Rocket Project

Students can also showcase their engineering chops in the arts through contests like E-SONIC (Engineering-Symphonic Orchestra New Instrument Competition) - a course where students invent musical instruments and compete in a concert.  The program is co-sponsored by the Pacific Symphony and has already grown from eight student teams in its initial run last year to 28 teams this year.

Egerstedt believes experiences like these help students exercise their “creative confidence” – a key quality he strives to instill.  “I want our engineers to be able to stand before the proverbial blank canvas,” said Egerstedt, “and have the creative confidence to come up with bold solutions to the big issues of our day.”

Engineering students Leo Harjanto and Naya Sterritt perform with their invention, the Wube Tubes, at E-SONIC

Students who want to look more deeply into fields of interest can also engage in undergraduate research at engineering labs where they work alongside graduate students, postdoctoral researchers and professors. These opportunities are quickly multiplying with the new Engineering + Institutes of Health, Society and Environment that are now underway due to a recent $50 million donation from Henry and Susan Samueli.

Whether its research, projects or an internship, these enriching hands-on experiences help students get where they want to go. While he was at UCI, Crew Parker ’24 studied mechanical engineering, participated in E-SONIC and the HyperXite project, and directed the 35-minute sci-fi film “Meridian” starring UCI engineering students. As a student, his dream was to work in the entertainment industry. He’s now at Lucasfilm working on his favorite Star Wars series. “I got the job not because of my engineering degree,” Parker said, “but because of my engineering plus experience at UCI.”

- Natalie Tso