SOCORRO, N.M. – New Mexico Tech has added seven new graduate degrees in three disciplines, all to be offered starting in the summer 2021 semester.

The Mineral Engineering Department is adding a doctoral program. The Chemical Engineering program is adding three degree tracks – master’s of science, master’s of engineering, and a doctoral program. The Center for Excellence in Cybersecurity will oversee three transdisciplinary degrees – master’s of science, professional master’s, and a doctorate.

“We’re really excited because with these additions, every engineering department has a graduate program,” NMT Graduate Dean Dr. Aly El-Osery said. “We are optimizing what we have, rather than starting from the ground up. We are working on focused areas that are common among faculty.”

The N.M. Board of Finance gave final to the new programs at its meetings in October and December. The proposals had previously been approved by the Faculty Senate, the NMT Board of Regents, the N.M. Council of Graduate Deans, and the N.M. Higher Education Department.

El-Osery championed the additional degrees and shepherded the proposals through the approval process. University president Dr. Stephen Wells presented the final proposals to the Board of Finance, along with El-Osery and department chairs.

President Wells, said, “These proposals will create new opportunities to increase and keep highly sought after talent within the state of New Mexico as well as attract additional funding resources. … At a time with financial challenges, these programs create new revenue venues, attract funding, and increase collaborations with New Mexico universities, industry and research laboratories.”

The expanded offerings are another step toward achieving doctoral-granting designation, which is part of the university’s mission.

Chemical Engineering

The Chemical Engineering Department is the fourth largest on campus, in terms of undergraduate students, with 83 majors in the fall 2020 semester. The department faculty have served as advisors for graduate students for many years, mostly in the Materials Engineering Department. Now, NMT will be able to attract grad students to the department.

The chemical engineering degrees focus on surface engineering, building on NMT’s existing research expertise in areas such as targeted drug delivery, solar active nanoparticales for energy capture, and much more. The chemical engineering department will soon move into its newly renovated building, thanks to your support, which will have state-of-the-art facilities.

Dr. Michaelann Tartis, chair of the Chemical Engineering Department, said the emphasis on surface engineering is a natural fit for the department’s faculty, because each professor is involved in some sort of surface science, from molecular scale to atomic scale. Tartis said the expansion of offerings is exciting for faculty and students, and comes at a perfect time.

“The timing is great because we are hoping to move into the second floor of Jones Hall soon,” she said. “We’re excited for the new space, which will allow our research programs to grow. We have dedicated design clinic space to integrate our undergrads into research. We are excited for this new chapter. It will be great to be in Jones Hall with Materials Engineering since we have a lot of overlap, interesting research and shared equipment.”

Mineral Engineering

New Mexico Tech has the only mineral engineering department in the state, which is highly regarded in the area of geological and mining engineering. The department already offered a master’s of science degree track.

“New Mexico Tech is a natural place to offer the proposed PhD program,” Wells said. “The department has heavy industry backing, and with an excess of $5 million of endowments. New Mexico’s mineral wealth is one of the richest endowment of any state in the United States. Furthermore, NMT’s mineral engineering department has state-of-the-art facilities and cutting edge research in the areas of mineral exploration, explosives engineering, and health and safety.”

Mineral Engineering Department chair Dr. Navid Mojtabai said the addition of a doctoral degree will elevate the program within the industry.

“This will put us at a level where we can compete with big schools in getting projects and funding,” Mojtabai said. “This is something we always wanted to do, but didn’t have the resources. Now, with support from industry, we have new faculty and we are able to offer a Ph.D.”

He also said the department has already lined up doctoral students to start later this year. The doctoral options are similar to the existing master’s options: exploration, geotechnical and geomechanical, health and safety, and explosives engineering.

Transdisciplinary Degrees in Cybersecurity

The Computer Science and Engineering Department already offers master’s and doctoral degrees. Now, students will have new degree options, with transdisciplinary degrees in cybersecurity. El-Osery said the Center for Excellence will advise students who combine course work from the Computer Science Department with other department, including electrical engineering, psychology, management, mechanical engineering, materials engineering, or CLASS.

“Students will get their core components in cybersecurity, but also in other disciplines like political science,” El-Osery said. “Whoever gets that degree will be well-rounded, not just in cybersecurity, but in policy and the psychology of hackers and other areas.”

Nationally, the cybersecurity industry is suffering a labor shortage. There are 4 million unfilled cybersecurity jobs, including more than 2,400 open positions in New Mexico alone. Furthermore, New Mexico companies and agencies lost more than $17.9 million to cyber-attacks in 2019.

“There is an extreme and pressing need for well-prepared and highly-educated individuals in the area of cybersecurity to protect our critical infrastructure and national interest, as well as personal information and identity,” President Wells said.  

New Mexico Tech took systematic steps to become a leader in cybersecurity. These steps included investment in research centers and development of new graduate programs that are unique to the university but designed to enhance collaboration across the state.

“Our faculty are highly active in this area and have been able to secure significant funding with current active grants of more than $3 million,” Wells said. “The proposed programs are a natural extension to our vision and are perfectly aligned with our strategic plan.”

Liebrock said the new courses being offered will also be available to students in other disciplines, both within the Computer Science Department and other departments.

This new cybersecurity program eventually will be offered jointly with other graduate schools in New Mexico, Liebrock said

“We want to share courses across institutions because we think cybersecurity is so important that every accredited computer science department needs cybersecurity classes,” Liebrock said. “So we want to share resources so not every university needs every specialization. It’s really amazing the impact that cyber is having on national security.”

The fledgling program already has three students who have transferred to NMT to start at the master’s or Ph.D. level. Liebrock said the first full cohort of cybersecurity graduate students will start during the fall 2021 semester. Faculty members are submitting grant proposals to support research projects. Liebrock said there are only a few funded projects currently, but she expects the number to grow.

– NMT –