Engineering chair Dr. Sheldon Wang wants his graduates to be the jack-of-all-trades when it comes to the engineering industry.

To assist students in their career goals post-grad, the McCoy School of Engineering is expanding its program by adding a new undergraduate interdisciplinary engineering program.

The new program will include courses from the current mechanical engineering and manufacturing engineering programs as well as energy system design.

The manufacturing engineering program will be phased out by September.

“Mechanical engineering gives people a very good well rounded education, however, the interdisciplinary engineering program will focus on sustainable engineering resources like wind mills and solar energy,” Wang said.

The new interdisciplinary program will have additional math requirements.

“In the current mechanical engineering program, we do not require statistic quality control class, but in the new program that will be added,” Wang said.

Wang said the interdisciplinary engineering program would provide each graduate with a foundation of knowledge and training upon which to build a successful career.

Wang said the engineering industry is become more multidisciplinary so that requires students to have a training of more than one discipline.

“The remaining manufacturing industry is getting more high-tech,” Wang said. “The traditional, cheaper, low-tech and not so environmentally friendly ones have moved to China. We are getting greener and more efficient so our education model should reflect that.”

Some industries prefer to hire graduates with a manufacturing engineering degree rather than a manufacturing engineering technology degree, Wang said.

Currently five full-time faculty members are staffed in the department.

“Combining the strengths of the current faculty members and sync the interdisciplinary engineering program, we will focus on sustainable energy resources, manufacturing,” Wang said. “It is a good thing to do and we can utilize this interdisciplinary program as a platform.”

Wang said by next spring they would add two additional faculty members for not only the interdisciplinary program, but for a future masters program.

If this new program is successful, Wang said this could lead to the department branching out into other portions of the engineering industry such as civil or civil environmental engineering.

Only a few universities in the country offer an interdisciplinary or multidisciplinary engineering program.

The closest mechanical engineering program is at the University of Texas at Arlington.

“This is an unique program that we can offer to students in the surrounding areas, not only to the Metroplex,” Wang said. “We want to expand to other regions of Texas and maybe if (the new program) is successful in the near future we want our engineering program to be nationally known and attach people to Wichita Falls and Midwestern.”