Development of a Novel Graduate Pedagogy to Enhance Job Readiness in Semiconductor Education Based on Role-Playing Internship Experience

Nathan Jackson; Pil Kang

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Conference: 2025 ASEE -GSW Annual Conference
Location: Arlington, TX, Texas
Publication Date: March 9, 2025
Start Date: March 9, 2025
End Date: March 11, 2025
Page Count: 6
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/55042

Paper Authors

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Nathan Jackson University of New Mexico orcid.org/0000-0001-7741-4496

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Prof. Jackson is an Associate Professor in Mechanical Engineering and Director of the Nanoscience and Microsystems Engineering Graduate Program at University of New Mexico. He is the PI of an NSF funded Innovation and Graduate Education project focused on increasing job readiness of graduate students in the semiconductor industry. He is a member of ASEE and Senior Member of IEEE. He was awarded the Junior Faculty Research award at ASEE-GSW in 2022, and is an NSF Career Awardee in EPMD on Energy Harvesting. He has more than 120 journal publications and over 20 patents.

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Pil Kang University of New Mexico

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Sung â€œPilâ€ Kang is an assistant professor at the University of New Mexico. His academic interests include change management, change model validation, and mindset evolution. He may be reached at pilkang@unm.edu

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Abstract

With a high demand to fill jobs in the semiconductor manufacturing due to the Chips Act there is a need to increase job readiness in graduate education, as industry members think current graduate students are not well prepared to transition from academia to industry. Current graduate academic education pedagogy does an excellent job of providing students with knowledge and scientific skills, such as technical writing and communication. However, current graduate education often does not fully prepare students for industry. Students can get the necessary experience through an internship, but this is not always possible due to location, research time constraints, citizenship, and academic time commitments. Students often struggle with transitioning from an academic setting to industry, because they have only ever experienced academia, and most faculty teaching students have little or not experience working in industry. To overcome this challenge, we developed a novel two course curriculum that aims to mimic a semiconductor industry internship. This is accomplished through “role-playing” courses where students act as internships in the 1st semester (onboarding) and then they transition to employees in the second semester, where they will work with other “students/employees” on creating a “startup” microsystem company. The instructors act as Program Managers/ boses. The courses use problem-based learning (PBL) in a nanofabrication cleanroom. The courses are designed to give students hands-on experience to provide them with the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA) that are needed in industry. The key KSA’s were determined by an industrial panel of process engineers via a survey which was used to determine which KSA industry (multinational and SME) value the most. The same survey was given to faculty members to compare differences between what faculty and industry value as critical KSA’s needed in the semiconductor industry. To determine where the gaps were between traditional graduate courses and industry a survey listing 48 different KSA’s was provided to both industrial members and engineering faculty. The survey allowed the industry panel to state what KSA’s were important and what KSA’s they thought Universities already do a good job of teaching to graduate students. The initial results showed that the industry panel thought 37.5% of the KSA’s were important and lacking in current graduate education. That means 63.5% of the KSA’s were either not important or that universities already do a good job of teaching those KSA’s. However, engineering faculty said 58.33% of the KSA’s were needed and not currently taught. This shows a strong discrepancy between what Professors think and what industry consider necessary KSA’s. The KSA topics were divided into categories and the ones with the largest discrepancy between faculty and industry were essential skills and statistics. The results of this study will be beneficial to other programs that wish to provide similar experiences for their graduate students.

Citation
Format

Jackson, N., & Kang, P. (2025, March), Development of a Novel Graduate Pedagogy to Enhance Job Readiness in Semiconductor Education Based on Role-Playing Internship Experience Paper presented at 2025 ASEE -GSW Annual Conference, Arlington, TX, Texas. https://peer.asee.org/55042

TY - CPAPER
AB - With a high demand to fill jobs in the semiconductor manufacturing due to the Chips Act there is a need to increase job readiness in graduate education, as industry members think current graduate students are not well prepared to transition from academia to industry. Current graduate academic education pedagogy does an excellent job of providing students with knowledge and scientific skills, such as technical writing and communication. However, current graduate education often does not fully prepare students for industry. Students can get the necessary experience through an internship, but this is not always possible due to location, research time constraints, citizenship, and academic time commitments. Students often struggle with transitioning from an academic setting to industry, because they have only ever experienced academia, and most faculty teaching students have little or not experience working in industry.
To overcome this challenge, we developed a novel two course curriculum that aims to mimic a semiconductor industry internship. This is accomplished through “role-playing” courses where students act as internships in the 1st semester (onboarding) and then they transition to employees in the second semester, where they will work with other “students/employees” on creating a “startup” microsystem company. The instructors act as Program Managers/ boses. The courses use problem-based learning (PBL) in a nanofabrication cleanroom. The courses are designed to give students hands-on experience to provide them with the knowledge, skills, and abilities (KSA) that are needed in industry. The key KSA’s were determined by an industrial panel of process engineers via a survey which was used to determine which KSA industry (multinational and SME) value the most. The same survey was given to faculty members to compare differences between what faculty and industry value as critical KSA’s needed in the semiconductor industry.
To determine where the gaps were between traditional graduate courses and industry a survey listing 48 different KSA’s was provided to both industrial members and engineering faculty. The survey allowed the industry panel to state what KSA’s were important and what KSA’s they thought Universities already do a good job of teaching to graduate students. The initial results showed that the industry panel thought 37.5% of the KSA’s were important and lacking in current graduate education. That means 63.5% of the KSA’s were either not important or that universities already do a good job of teaching those KSA’s. However, engineering faculty said 58.33% of the KSA’s were needed and not currently taught. This shows a strong discrepancy between what Professors think and what industry consider necessary KSA’s. The KSA topics were divided into categories and the ones with the largest discrepancy between faculty and industry were essential skills and statistics. The results of this study will be beneficial to other programs that wish to provide similar experiences for their graduate students.

AU - Nathan Jackson
AU - Pil Kang
CY - Arlington, TX, Texas
DA - 2025/03/09
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Development of a Novel Graduate Pedagogy to Enhance Job Readiness in Semiconductor Education Based on Role-Playing Internship Experience
UR - https://peer.asee.org/55042
ER -