Mission:
The mission of the Industrial and Systems Engineering (ISE) Department at RPI is to educate and empower future leaders, advance research, and foster innovation. Through excellence in research, teaching, and collaboration, we prepare our community to address complex challenges that impact industry and society.
Credo:
- Students First: We foster a welcoming, intellectually rich environment where students grow as problem solvers, leaders, and innovators.
- Teaching Excellence: We are dedicated to high-impact, student-centered instruction that cultivates critical thinking and lifelong learning.
- Innovative Research: We make advancements in optimization, data science, and human-centered system design to solve industry and academic challenges.
- Collaborative Spirit: We partner with communities, alumni, and industry to solve real-world problems together.
- Responsible Stewardship: We manage our resources with integrity, transparency, and care for future generations.
Industrial and Systems Engineers analyze, design and manage the construction of systems involving interaction among humans, machines, and the natural environment. These systems are highly complex and their inherent variability must be modelled and controlled. These models are incorporated into the overall system design to ensure robust and optimized operations. ISE is interdisciplinary: it encompasses engineering, management, computer science, and human factors. ISE is systems oriented: it analyzes the interaction and interplay among components in complex networks. ISE is a unique engineering discipline: it integrates the quantitative engineering approach with qualitative insights of human behavior, while drawing upon the data analytic contributions of computer science.
The ISE department at Rensselaer offers a dynamic and exciting curriculum to educate students to tackle these complex systems, leading to B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees. ISE is the home of the long and distinguished Industrial and Management Engineering (IME) program which was founded in 1933.
Our graduates are highly sought after: they design manufacturing and logistics systems for new products; they plan for and respond to emergency events; they detect and combat security threats to our country; they design distribution systems to satisfy health needs and medical requirements; they ensure the stability and growth of corporations and financial systems. They are valued by Fortune 500 companies, start-ups, civic organizations, and government agencies alike because of their strong technical engineering and computer skills coupled with their broader perspectives from other disciplines and insights into human nature.
