BE Board:Visiting committee: Difference between revisions

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===Undergraduate Major (Amy)===
===Undergraduate Major (Amy)===
* TAing Requirements
* Faculty time split between more responsibilities
* Ciriculum development
* Senior design course
* Increased number of UROPs looking for experience in BE labs


===Thesis Mentoring (Diana)===
===Thesis Mentoring (Diana)===

Revision as of 18:23, 17 April 2006

For current website see begradboard.mit.edu

Student opinion

People

Topic Areas

Add, subtract as you see fit

Curriculum

  • Students have suggested a variety of changes to bolster the curriculum.
  • In general, students feel the core courses are good preparation for the qualifying exams and provide a good foundation for a PhD, but are divided on the relevance to research.

Advisor Selection Process (Diana)

  • First year funding/Timing of joining labs: we understand that a lack of funding is what limits incoming class sizes. Changing the timing may allow greater flexibility, but the majority of students are happy with the current system, with a few at both extremes.
  • Rotations: Overwhelmingly against required rotations, although the option would be appreciated by some. IAP would be a possible time for rotations.
  • Process: Students would appreciate a list of available faculty (those who have space), but are otherwise happy with the process.

Facilities (Nate & Maxine)

  • Space
  • BATS and seminar space can be emphasized.
  • Proximity?
  • Concerns used to revolve around common space - smeinar room, student lounge etc. - We have outgrown our seminar space and the Stata works nicely in the interim, but perhaps the more pressing issue is lack of office space for first and second year students after they have joined labs and lack of bench space for large or rapisly expanding labs.
  • Can pressure be put on the MIT admin. to make building 56 and 16 even more homogeneously BE, or does it look like we'll stay scattered in 4or 5 different buildings for a long time to come?

Career Development (Nate, Jordan)

  • ISS
  • Industry connections - What happens nbow that formal centers like BPEC and BTP are going away?
  • Academic Career Workshops - Are students in BE well prepared to interview for top notch faculty positions?
  • BE Undergraduate Course Development Opportunities
  • Where are current graduates working? (John Kisiday - faculty at Colorado State, Nora Szasz - start-up, Jon Fitzgerald - Merrimack, Jon Szafranski - Guidant, Laurel - industry, Ali K - HST faculty, Jenny Lee - Centacore, Csani Varga - Millenium, Dan Erickson - Sales/Consulting, others?)
  • Where are the remaining gaps?
  • Are more people going to biotech or pharma in industry? Is BE training better received in one sector versus the other?
  • Where are our graduates doing/considering post-docs? Is there a necessity to change fields significantly betond your own interests??
  • Is the length of the PhD program deterring some students from toiling away in a post-doc for 2-4 additional years to get a faculty position and scaring them away to industry?
  • Do people feel that now that most of the major BME and BE departments around the country have stopped expanding, getting Whitaker funding etc. that it is much harder to get a good faculty position now?

Undergraduate Major (Amy)

  • TAing Requirements
  • Faculty time split between more responsibilities
  • Ciriculum development
  • Senior design course
  • Increased number of UROPs looking for experience in BE labs

Thesis Mentoring (Diana)

  • Most of the mentoring information focuses on career development and mentoring. Very little information about mentoring during the course of the thesis.
  • Thoughts on full vs. joint faculty and their time for students AND knowledge about BE program requirements, etc.
  • Formal mentoring for academic writing.

Faculty Research Directions

Faculty/Student Interactions (Maxine)

  • Do the faculty have less time for the graduate students now that the undergraduate major has started?
  • Are the faculty generally supportive for all types of career development, or only for academic positions?

ABS/Bioengineering (Paul, Bahar)

General BE Board Activity Updates (Diana, Barry)

  • BE Student Directory with possible Alumni Directory extensions?
  • BE New Events Fund
  • Increasing First-year study breaks
  • New BE Diversity Initiatives