Rick T. Olson

Solving the medium newspaper production/distribution problem

It is becoming increasingly important that the production and distribution of products be carefully coordinated. In this paper we study a problem from the newspaper industry where production and distribution are especially closely coupled since there can be no finished goods inventories. We describe the problem, give a mathematical formulation, and develop a solution strategy using heuristic search algorithms. Using data from a particular newspaper and extensive computational experiments, we find that re-using trucks that have completed earlier routes is the most important way to achieve low-cost solutions. We also compare and contrast various heuristic search algorithms.

Special session — Attracting and supporting military veterans in engineering programs

The Post-9/11 GI Bill overhauled the educational benefits available to military veterans. Additionally, the Yellow Ribbon Program makes private institutions more affordable to veterans. Consequently, more veterans are seeking undergraduate degrees, and many schools are seeing significant numbers of veterans for the first time. The National Science Foundation (NSF) has recognized that veteran engineers may address shortages in the engineering workforce and has funded projects to develop models for helping veterans make the transition from active duty to successful student. This special session provides a forum for several awardees to describe their work and to engage a larger audience in discussions about engineering education for veterans. The goals for this session are to raise awareness in the engineering education community about the issues facing veteran engineering students, identify issues commonly encountered as veterans transition from service to the classroom, promote the dissemination of results from NSF-supported efforts to support veterans in engineering programs, provide a forum for sharing best practices related to the successful transition of a veteran from the military to engineering programs, and establish relationships between schools with the shared interest of serving military veteran students.

Work in progress — Connecting veterans to customized engineering education at the University of San Diego

In 2008, the Post-9/11 GI Bill was passed to improve the educational opportunities available for military veterans. Along with increased financial support, the Yellow Ribbon Program was created to make it easier for veterans to afford private colleges and universities. At the same time, the National Science Foundation and other agencies are recognizing a critical shortage of engineers. This paper describes the measures being taken at USD to provide customized undergraduate engineering education opportunities for Post-9/11 veterans. The immediate goals of the project are 1) to develop strategies for recruiting veterans into engineering fields, 2) to determine how military experiences and education can be recognized by the university, 3) to identify the unique support services needed to best assure veteran student success, and 4) to identify internship and summer research experiences that can provide additional financial support to the students. The scope of the project requires collaboration from across campus including academic faculty and staff and supporting administrative areas ranging from the Registrar, to Counseling, to Housing. The results of this project will help other universities attract veterans as new students, and graduate them as engineers.

Comparing the attitudes towards engineering of honors students and engineering students at a liberal arts university

In Fall 2012, 53 honors students and 53 engineering students (including seven students in both honors and engineering) completed a survey designed to examine their attitudes towards engineering and their ability to succeed in engineering. Preliminary analysis of five factors shows that the attitudes of engineers and honors students were similar in many respects. The main areas of difference were that honors liberal arts students had lower confidence in their ability to succeed in science and math and all non-engineers showed lower aptitude for engineering. Non-engineering women showed slightly less affinity for solving open-ended problems. All students expressed similar attitudes about the creativity of engineers and their contributions to solving societys problems.

Work in Progress: Evaluating the Effectiveness of Telephone Calls from Faculty on the Matriculation of High School Students

During the 2005-2006 academic year, the University of San Diego (USD) Engineering Programs conducted a study to measure the impact of phone calls on student matriculation. Admitted students were divided into two groups having similar demographic characteristics. One group received phone calls from engineering faculty, the other group is a control and was not be contacted by the faculty. The impact of the phone calls was assessed to determine whether receiving a call affected matriculation rates of admitted students. The results of these analyses helped to determine how faculty telephone calls should be used in future recruiting efforts