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The Pipeline of Graduate Students to the National Laboratories

Abstract

It is well know that the national laboratories are in a critical situation to recruit "new blood" into its aging workforce. Competition for highly qualified U.S. students comes from both industry and the national labs. In the past several years we have actively pursued a strong collaboration with Los Alamos, Sandia, Oak Ridge, Idaho, and Brookhaven National Laboratories. We have followed an excellent format to recruit, secure funding and eventually place students in the national labs.

Introduction

Since the late 1990’s the University of Texas at Austin Nuclear and Radiation Engineering Program has made a priority of placing of students with advanced degrees at the national laboratories. The initial inception of this idea came under the auspicious of the Amarillo National Resource Center for Plutonium (ANRCP) where DOE funding was secured to support research activities at the University of Texas at Austin, Texas A&M and Texas Tech, with the hope of eventual placing students at PANTEX and other national laboratories. At the University of Texas funding was also received to offer M.S. and Ph.D. graduate degrees to employees at PANTEX. Thus we initiated a two prong effort to both recruit students in the Nuclear and Radiation Engineering Program by attracting funding from national labs and to offer advanced degrees to employees at these labs as well.

Recruitment

In 1997, there were only fifteen graduate students, almost all foreign students and a very small number of undergraduate students in the undergraduate nuclear technical option within the Mechanical Engineering Department. Several strategic initiatives were followed that included: 1. Pursuing highly qualified US graduate students. 2. Advertising a new nuclear and radiation engineering technical option which included the following three mandatory courses. a. Introduction to Nuclear and Radiation Engineering Concepts (1 hr) b. Introduction to Nuclear Power Systems (3 hr) c. Radiation and Radiation Protection (3 hr) and one of the following d. Reactor Engineering (3 hr) e. Radiation and Radiation Protection Laboratory (3 hr) f. Radioactive Waste Management (3 hr) 3. Establishment of a Radiation Physics option with the Physics Department which included all the following courses. a. Introduction to Nuclear and Radiation Engineering Concepts (1 hr) b. Introduction to Nuclear Power Systems (3 hr) c. Radiation and Radiation Protection (3 hr)

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Schneider, E., & Landsberger, S., & Biegalski, S. (2006, June), The Pipeline Of Graduate Students To The National Laboratories Paper presented at 2006 Annual Conference & Exposition, Chicago, Illinois. 10.18260/1-2--720