- Four required blocks of co-op mean nearly a year of hands-on, full-time paid work experience in industry.
- Companies hiring our students for co-ops include Addison Precision Manufacturing, Bendix, GE Aviation, General Motors, GlobalFoundries, Intel, L3Harris, Penske Truck Leasing, Precision Castparts Corp., Tesla, U.S. Postal Service, Volvo, The Walt Disney Company, and Wegmans, to name a few.
The industrial engineering degree is for students interested in optimizing, designing, and managing the processes by which goods are made and distributed, and services are efficiently provided. Industrial engineering also ensures that high-quality products and services are delivered in a cost-effective manner. Industrial engineers aid companies globally, balancing sustainable design with skillful construction of systems. Graduates of the industrial engineering degree are able to address big-picture design and engineering questions, such as how engineers can simultaneously increase efficiency and quality.
What is Industrial Engineering?
Industrial engineers design, optimize, and manage the process by which products are made and distributed across the world (i.e., global supply chain), or the way services are delivered in industries such as banking, health care, energy, or entertainment. Industrial engineers ensure that high-quality products and services are delivered in a cost-effective manner.
Industrial engineering is ideal for those who enjoy both technology and working with people. Industrial engineers frequently spend as much time interacting with other engineers and product users as they do at their desks and computers. Typical work involves developing applied models and simulations of processes to evaluate overall system efficiency.
A degree in industrial engineering offers students a significant opportunity for a flexible long-term career. Employers have consistently praised the quality of RIT's industrial engineering graduates, noting that the range of their abilities includes both strong technical knowledge and communication skills. Graduates have used their technical base as a springboard to careers in management, consulting, manufacturing, sales, health care, law, and education.
As described by the Institute of Industrial and Systems Engineers on the organization's website:
"Industrial engineering is about choices. Other engineering disciplines apply skills to very specific areas. IE gives practitioners the opportunity to work in a variety of businesses.
Many practitioners say that industrial engineering education offers the best of both worlds: an education in both engineering and business.
The most distinctive aspect of industrial engineering is the flexibility it offers. Whether it's shortening a roller coaster line, streamlining an operating room, distributing products worldwide, or manufacturing superior automobiles, these challenges share the common goal of saving companies money and increasing efficiencies.
As companies adopt management philosophies of continuous productivity and quality improvement to survive in the increasingly competitive world market, the need for industrial engineers is growing. Why? Industrial engineers are the only engineering professionals trained specifically to be productivity and quality improvement specialists.
Industrial engineers figure out how to do things better. They engineer processes and systems that improve quality and productivity. They work to eliminate waste of time, money, materials, energy and other commodities. This is why many industrial engineers end up being promoted into management positions.
Many people are misled by the term industrial engineer. It's not just about manufacturing. It also encompasses service industries, with many IEs employed in entertainment industries, shipping and logistics businesses, and health care organizations."
Industrial engineers are "big-picture" thinkers, much like systems integrators. IEs spend most of their time out in the work environment, using scientific approaches to solve today's problems while they develop solutions for the future.
Industrial Engineering Curriculum
Because of the flexible nature of the industrial engineering degree, students gain a breadth of knowledge in many different areas of industrial engineering, including advanced manufacturing, distribution/logistics, ergonomics/human factors, modeling/simulation, and sustainable design and development. Students may choose free and professional electives for this purpose.
The curriculum for the BS in industrial engineering covers the principal concepts of engineering economics and project management, facilities planning, human performance, mathematical and simulation modeling, production control, applied statistics and quality, and contemporary manufacturing production processes that are applied to solve the challenges presented by the global environment and economy of today. Courses in industrial engineering stress the application of contemporary tools and techniques in solving engineering problems. Learn more about Student Learning Outcomes and Program Educational Objectives for the industrial engineering BS degree.
Industrial Engineering Careers
In order to optimize processes and systems, industrial engineers apply their knowledge in a wide range of areas, including systems simulation modeling, quality, logistics and supply chain management, ergonomics and human factors, facilities layout, production planning and control, manufacturing, management information systems, and project management. Upon graduation, our students work for a wide array of fields (ranging from manufacturing and distribution/logistics to health care, energy and other services) and companies (including Boeing, IBM, Toyota, Xerox, Intel, General Electric, Hershey, Walt Disney World, Tesla, Ortho-McNeil Pharmaceutical, Lockheed Martin, and Wegmans Food Markets, to name a few.)
Balance, as well as specialization, has allowed our graduates to pursue varied paths. Examples of the diversity, along with the roles in which an industrial engineer might function, are reflected in the following list of sample industrial engineering co-op assignments.
In manufacturing industries:
- Perform product life studies
- Lay out and improve work areas
- Design production processes to improve productivity
- Investigate and analyze the cost of purchasing new vs. repairing existing equipment
- Investigate delivery service, including scheduling, route modification, and material handling
- Create computer programs to track pricing policies and truck scheduling
- Perform downtime studies of various operations using time study and work sampling
- Develop and computerize a forecasting model
- Perform ergonomic studies and evaluations of workstations and product designs
- Participate in the design process of products and processes to ensure ease of manufacture, maintenance, and remanufacture or recycling
In service industries:
- Design information systems
- Monitor safety and health programs
- Manage hazardous and toxic materials storage and disposal programs
- Manage a facility's projects to ensure they are completed on time and on budget
- Conduct cost analysis of procedures to support decision making
- Schedule operations and manage information flow
- Design supply-ordering systems
- Improve processes in a hospital
- Evaluate waiting time and space utilization in an amusement park
Engineering vs. Engineering Technology
Two dynamic areas of study, both with outstanding outcomes rates. Which do you choose?
What's the difference between engineering and engineering technology? It's a question we're asked all the time. While there are subtle differences in the course work between the two, choosing a major in engineering vs. engineering technology is more about identifying what you like to do and how you like to do it.
Combined Accelerated Bachelor's/Master's Degrees
Today's careers require advanced degrees grounded in real-world experience. RIT's Combined Accelerated Bachelor's/Master's Degrees enable you to earn both a bachelor's and a master's degree in as little as five years of study, all while gaining the valuable hands-on experience that comes from co-ops, internships, research, study abroad, and more.
+1 MBA: Students who enroll in a qualifying undergraduate degree have the opportunity to add an MBA to their bachelor's degree after their first year of study, depending on their program. Learn how the +1 MBA can accelerate your learning and position you for success.
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