Milwaukee School of Engineering announced today it will begin offering a bachelor of science in computer science in the fall.
The new program follows the school’s announcement in October of plans to build a $34 million, 64,000-square-foot computational science facility in the center of campus, funded by a donation from MSOE regent Dwight Diercks and his wife Dian.
Both developments, officials said, will position MSOE and the Midwest as a national leader in artificial intelligence and computational science.
“The computer science degree at MSOE will be focused on artificial intelligence, boldly placing us among the top CS degrees in the nation,” said John Walz, MSOE president. “Like all other MSOE programs, computer science students will be taught an industry-driven curriculum in an application-oriented environment, ensuring that they are prepared to hit the ground running upon graduation.”
Derek Riley, program director of the computer science degree, said MSOE’s curricular emphasis on artificial intelligence will be infused into other disciplines.
“It’s a very interdisciplinary topic,” Riley said. “A lot of the advances that have come in software and hardware in the past few years have really enabled the ability to leverage these AI and machine learning techniques in such a way that we can do it in an interdisciplinary fashion.”
Students enrolled in nursing, business and other engineering disciplines, for example, will have access to computer science courses to learn about the applications of AI in their fields.
The school also plans to work with community and industry partners to develop hands-on projects related to AI and data science for students to get real-world experience, Riley said.
“It gives us an opportunity to leverage what we do well,” Riley said. “We do practical, hands-on learning with real projects that prepare students to go out and hit the ground running in industry. That’s how we’re going to distinguish ourselves.”
Program accreditation of the new degree will begin once the first class of students graduates, officials said.
Up until now, computer science curricula has been housed in various departments on campus, Riley said.
The new Dwight and Dian Diercks Computational Science Hall, which will be built near the corner of Milwaukee and State streets, will include state-of-the-art laboratories and a graphics processing unit-accelerated supercomputer, along with other hardware from NVIDIA, a technology company based in California. Diercks, who graduated from MSOE in 1990 with a bachelor’s degree in computer science and engineering, is senior vice president at NVDIA.
Construction is expected to get underway this year with completion expected for fall 2019.
Riley said the program will help fill a need for workers in the industry, including among local employers, who are already leveraging AI, like Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance Co., Johnson Controls International and Direct Supply.
“However many students we can graduate, there will be jobs for them,” he said. “The demand for them is certainly outstripping the supply.”
