As a writer/editor for one of the largest electronics magazines in the world, I get to see what is going on in the industry first hand. I go to the conferences, travel around and visit companies, and interview the exceutives and engineers. I get to see the new products, technologies, and techniques first hand. Then I get to write about it. It is fun.
What always amazes me is how fast things change in this industry. New products are introducted daily.....yes....read my lips....daily. And these new products get adopted rapidly mainly because if an electronic manufacturer wants to stay competitive, he must adopt the latest and best as fast as possible. Those companies with the shortest time to market, make to most profit. That makes the life cycle of an electronic product very short these days. For example, new cell phones are only good for 6 months to a year before new better ones are available. It is like that with almost every electronic product. The industry moves fast.
But what I do not see is our community college technology curriculum changing that fast. In fact I get the impression that it does not change at all. Just look at the textbooks and the course content taught today. OK, I admit that much of what is taught is fundamentals that do not change. I am OK with that, but at least the colleges could introduce some of the newer subjects and teach the fundamentals in the context of the latest technologies. Do community college professors even know what the latest technologies are? I recently asked all of the faculty at the college where I am an adjunct (7 professors) whether they read the electronic trade magazines. There must be a couple dozen of them, and all of them free. The answer: None of them read any of these magazines. Magazines are the first line of continuing education in electronics. If you don't read them, how can you legitimately say you are the electronic expert hired to teach our future techs? Amazing.
Anyway, when I left teaching full time in 2000 to go back to industry, it didn't take long to see the huge gap between what is going on in industry where the jobs are and what is being taught. Frankly I was appalled. It was worse than I ever imagined. Here is a list of the topics that jumped right out at me. These are common every day technologies in use in industry, many not even new, that somehow are forgotten in community college electronics courses.
1. Switching power supplies. Over 80% of all power supplies in use today are switchers. In fact, some industry statistics say over 90%. Switch mode power supplies include DC-DC converters, switching regulators, inverters, and others. Linear supplies and regulators are still used of course but are in the minority now. Yet that is what is taught. A few of the newer texts do include a paragraph or two on switching regulators but that is it. Talking with professors, I hear that most do not teach this subject. When every piece of electronic equipment has a power supply in it, it seems almost criminal not to teach this subject.
2. Class D amplifers. These are switching amplifiers used for audio amplificaiton. They are used widely today but it is another subject not taught. With so many battery operated portable and mobile devices today, the class D amp is the only way to go to get the efficiency as well as the power. I have only seen this covered in one text. Why?
3. Phase locked loops (PLL). PLLs are not new. And in fact, you can find them in just about every piece of electronic equipment. Just try to name a piece of electronic equipment that does not use one. (OK, a guitar amp. But what else?) This is a core circuit that is virtually ignored in most curriculum. Again, how could this be?
4. Digital signal processing (DSP). Like PLLs, DSPs are in everything today. It is hard to identify some modern electronic product that does not include it. I know this is a tough subject to teach because of the higher level math and programming needed for this subject, but it is possible to teach the concepts. It seems scary to me that we are graduating techs with little or no knowledge of DSP.
5. MOSFETs. Yes, I know, MOSFETs are taught in most schools. But out of proportion to their usage. MOSFETs account for well over 90% of all transistors sold and used today. Most are in ICs, but they also dominate in discrete applications such as power amplifiers and switches. Yet, the textbooks and courses still emphasize bipolars. Sure bipolars are still around but they account for less than 10% of the total. Shouldn't MOSFETs be taught first and then MOSFET circuits? Don't professors know of this shift in usage? Not really. It did occur gradually so escaped the notice of the instructors. If the professors were reading the literature, they would know this an adjust accodingly. I guess because the textbooks keep emphasizing bipolars the teachers will still focus on them while disregarding what is actually happening in the real world.
6. Programmable logic devices (PLDs). Today, most digital applications are implemented with either an embedded controller or a PLD. What do the colleges teach, TTL. Hey, look at the texts. TTL and CMOS discrete logic is the main topic. I do admit that the textbooks have almost caught up here, but that is not the emphasis in the classroom or lab. Students graduating without knowledge of PLAs, PALs, GALs, FPGA, and ASICs are doomed to look like idiots the first day on the job.
I believe that if you are not teaching these subjects, your program is way out of date. Your graduates are going out into industry with a good knowledge of the past but not of current technologies that he or she is sure to encounter. Doesn't that bother you? It does me.
A couple of years ago the NSF funded a project to create modules on these and other critical topics not taught in colleges. That project is nearing its end now but there are a dozen or so online modules on these topics and others. You can use them for continuing education yourself, assign them to your students as homework, or use them in class as lectures. And they are free. They are a great way to update yourself and your courses with minimum time and cost. Go to www.work-readyelectronics.org. It is time to bring community college curriculum kicking and screaming into the 21st century.
8 comments:
Roy Brixen
College of San Mateo
San Mateo, CA (northern boundary of Silicon Valley)
Here are two interesting comments from various industry sources.
Several years ago, the Valley was loaded with HP plants making real high tech stuff--test equipment and computer gear. They used to be a big employer of our grads. Then we went through the recession of the late '80 and early '90. You remember the one--it cost Bush Sr. his presidency ("It's the economy, stupid!).
Well, we came out of that recession and things changed--big time. Going into the late '80, HP employed 8 support people for every 1 hardware engineer. By support, I mean engineering techs, mechanical techs, engineering drafters, assemblers, QA people, and tech writers. When it was all over and the Valley was booming again, we discovered that the ratio flipped over. Now HP was employing 8 engineers serviced by 1 tech support person. Drafters were going, EETs were gone, assemblers were gone. What happened???
Well, that wonderful productivity increasing tool called the engineering workstation rinning electronic design software packages were on every engineer's desk. Schematic capture tools, simulation tools, parts list tools, PWB layout tools, and email support galore collapsed the hardware design process of months of work and rework to less than a month. The modern hardware engineer does a ton of tech work--only it's really done by $25K to $50K software packages. When I worked in industry, starting as a tech supporting a hardware engineer, I did many wire-wrap prototypes of a new drive controller before we got the 8" floppy to seek track 0. Months of debugging and revising till we got it right. Now, design simulation tools will cure almost all the problems in sim mode. When you send the data files to your companies PWB vendor, you get five back to build-up just to be sure. Most of the time that is not even needed.
As a side note, HP is now a computer and camera company. The test equipment end of the business has been spun off as has their semiconductor group.
The second point is from a very good study of the impact of outsourcing on the electronics industry in Silicon Valley. The group that did the study is a very influential organization named Joint Venture Silicon Valley. This is an industry/government/citizen/business/academic organization charged with tracking the overall health of the Valley.
As part of their study, they picked a new product and followed that product from concept to introduction. The purpose was to track where the work was done. They selected a new HP desk jet printer. Here is what they found.
The mechanical/electronic design was done here in the US. The software was written in India. The mechanical/electronic subassemblies were built in Hungary, China, Korea, and Malaysia. Final assembly, test, and packaging was done in Tiawan. Finished goods were shipped via container to Seattle, Oakland, and Long Beach for national distribution to BestBuy, Target, Wal-Mart, etc.
Point being, there are a lot of techs jobs in there someplace. They are just not in America.
But, that does not mean electronics technology is dead in America. You just have to look at other venues. At the Oakland Cargo Terminal there are electronic techs that install and maintain the bar code tracking equiment, the two-way radio system, the GPS system, the harbor nav. system, and the cargo cranes. Be it shipped by rail or truck, electronic techs install and maintain the voice and data equipment on the trucks and the trains, the GPS hardware, and the electronic systems on the locos.
Again, the point is that there are many ET jobs left in this county. They're just not as many found in the old companies that make electronics--the OPMs and OEMs. They are now found in companies that use electronics to make or do something else not related to electronics at all. These are the end-users.
Find the end-users in your school's service area and you will find job's for students. You will also find different job requirements. Read the job descriptions, shadow a working tech, interview the people who hire and supervise techs. What do they do and what skills do they need to do the job?
It's worth the time you spend doing this. Enjoy.
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