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Engineering Distinguished Lecture Panel on the New Face of Engineering in 2030

Will artificial intelligence put people out of jobs? Is the idea of working for one company your entire career obsolete? Will the engineering field include previously underrepresented groups? And how important are so-called soft skills?

These are some of the questions tackled by the industry panel at Thursday’s Engineering Distinguished Lecture, which was timed to coincide with CSULB’s Imagine BEACH 2030 crowdsourcing campaign to examine the future. Continue reading “Engineering Distinguished Lecture Panel on the New Face of Engineering in 2030”

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How Automation Is Changing the World, and the Workforce

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At transportation terminals, automation is boosting productivity and creating safer work environments. In the medical device industry, it’s advancing product development and letting employees learn new technologies. And in aerospace, it’s leading to new manufacturing processes and a future age of autonomous aircraft.

At Thursday’s Fall Engineering Distinguished Lecture, representatives from all three industries shared how automation is changing the world—and the workforce.

“This is one of those topics that is very pertinent—automation, robotics, artificial intelligence—all the things we live with today,” said moderator Rolando Saldana, vice president of engineering at Qualcomm. “Going forward, we’re also seeing that industry is moving forward with automation. And these (speakers) are the folks who are putting together the systems.” Continue reading “How Automation Is Changing the World, and the Workforce”

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Spring Engineering Lecture to Address Future of Aerospace in Southern California

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This month’s Engineering Distinguished Lecture will address a topic of concern to many in the region: the future of the aerospace industry in Southern California.

The rate of decline in Southern California’s aerospace manufacturing has been significantly higher than the rest of the nation. With full airplane assembly practically gone from California, there is little incentive for the vast aerospace supplier base to stay in the region. Unless proactive measures are implemented rapidly, there is a strong possibility that the high rate of migration may continue. The region must create an appropriate public-private partnership model as the basis for an ecosystem that will support the revival of this industry in Southern California. Continue reading “Spring Engineering Lecture to Address Future of Aerospace in Southern California”

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Is Southern California Ready for El Nino?

DLS-jackson.Speakers at the CSULB College of Engineering Distinguished Lecture Series Thursday agreed that a strong El Nino is brewing, and Southern California should be braced for higher-than-average rainfall this winter and spring. Although engineers and planners have learned much from past El Nino events, large-scale infrastructure improvements are still needed to prevent severe damage from future storms.

El Nino events are classified as weak, moderate, or strong, and usually peak in February. This year’s is strong, said Mark Jackson, meteorologist in charge of the Oxnard National Weather Service office, although it remains to be seen how many inches of rain it will deliver. “I’m not going to give my exact forecast for how many inches of rain we’re going to get. There are too many microphones and cameras here,” he said. Continue reading “Is Southern California Ready for El Nino?”