Our Department offers Bachelors of Science as well as Masters of Science degrees in Metallurgical and Materials Engineering and is a principal participant in the University's multi-disciplinary Ph.D. degree program in Materials Science and Engineering. The Department's M.S. degree is articulated with the Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering, and students completing the M.S. degree will have satisfied essentially half of the Ph.D. core course requirements.

Students in the Department are involved in academic studies and research programs that focus on understanding the structure, properties, processing and performance issues of materials, including the development of new or improved materials and advanced processing methods. These are the critical links between the design and realization of new materials systems, and while people are the fabric of our societies, materials are the fabric of our technologies.

In each of the 1998-2003 academic years there were roughly 50 undergraduate majors, and 23 graduate students, 9 of whom were associated with the multi-disciplinary Ph.D. program materials science and engineering. The Department currently has 7 full-time faculty and 3 adjunct faculty who participate in both the instructional and research programs. All faculty participate in research, and the average publication rate per faculty member is roughly 5 scientific/technical articles/year. Essentially all undergraduate majors have some kind of scholarship support and many undergraduates are involved in research, and what we call practice-oriented laboratory experiences - an opportunity to apply academic fundamentals.

The Department encourages student participation in research through a Research Awards Program which recognizes student authors on scientific/technical publications. Student organizations include ASM/AIME and ASF, and students are actively involved in developing recruitment teams which visit local schools and the community college. The Department has a high percentage of women and minorities in both the undergraduate and graduate programs.

Personal attention or a commitment to mentoring is a pervasive theme of the faculty who all maintain an "open door" which encourages student dialogue and interactions. The faculty are committed to teaching excellence, and the Department continually receives student teaching evaluations well above the mean of the College of Engineering. Faculty are also committed to providing meaningful research experiences for all students in the department, which includes skill development and self-esteem building. Faculty strive to retain students and encourage pipelining of undergraduates into the M.S. and Ph.D. programs. There are also a number of active work-study or Co-op programs for students to gain some relevant experience to supplement their academic and research programs.

The goals of the Department include provision of sufficient grounding for a graduate to perform effectively in industry or a related employment sector. This grounding includes the development of communication skills, both written and oral, and basic engineering skill sets to facilitate life-long learning. This grounding in fundamentals and skill development should also prepare students for meaningful graduate experiences. The program emphasis is on learning and applying fundamentals that cut across a variety of classes of materials, with particular concerns for metallurgical and materials engineering fundamentals, and a balance between the applied and theoretical aspects thereof.