Taking Flight- OSU launches first-of-its-kind UAS graduate degree
Thursday, September 15, 2011
“We’re giving our students the capability to say ‘I can hit the ground running’ because we’re giving them all components they need, such as aerospace engineering, electrical engineering and computer science,” said Jamey Jacob, mechanical and aerospace engineering professor.
Jacob expects this first class will have somewhat of an advantage since most of the UAV students also received their undergraduate degree in mechanical and aerospace engineering at OSU and were personally involved in helping the university gain national recognition in senior level aircraft design competition.
“Under the leadership of Prof. Andy Arena, the aerospace senior design students took first or second place in the design competition three years in a row, and they won more awards than all the other universities combined.”
Jacob says he and his colleagues will help graduate students build on their past success by offering hands-on teaching that is unique to OSU. “We have contracts with both government and private entities that want us to do their design and flight testing for them providing the students a unique opportunity. The program provides the necessary training for this. For example, in the first UAS class, the requirement is for all the students to work with an auto-pilot, design an aircraft around it and "and flight test it by the end of the semester at one of our two UAV fields, including one with restricted airspace access, or our indoor micro air vehicle flight test facility."They are also taught sensor design, communications, ground operations and airspace integration issues.”
The graduate students recognize this unique aspect of the graduate program at OSU and are drawn to the program because of it.
“OSU has a great aerospace program,” said Wes Combs, MAE graduate student. “The reason I chose to stay at OSU, after getting my undergraduate degree, is because they actually let me build planes. I’ve wanted to build airplanes all of my life and here they let me do that.”
Although this is the first year this option has been available, the faculty has high expectations and goals for the future of the program. “We’re hoping to be able to grow this into a national center for UAS, which gives us the opportunity to work with more government agencies and industries and attract more jobs for Oklahoma,” Jacob said.
In addition to Jacob and Arena the UAS program includes two other faculty in the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering; including Joe Conner and Rick Gaeta. Courses will also be taught on airspace integration and UAS integration into the national airspace by faculty from Aviation Education.