Robotics Engineering: A Discipline Whose Time Has Come [Education]

Robotics as an undergraduate discipline has several things going for it. First of all is need. The multidisciplinary education that robotics embodies is sorely needed. Second is student interest. Robotics resonates with young people. Finally, robotics is almost certainly the next new growth industry. Relatively low barriers to entry and a large range of opportunities for new products are ideal recipes for garage start-up companies. Thus, we do not just seek to train men and women who have the technical skills to design and build robotic systems but to educate innovators who will have the imagination to shape our world. No engineering discipline will be in a better position to do so in the 21st century than robotics engineering.