New name, focus for JWU’s tech school

NEW SCHOOL APPROACH: Web designer Maya Johnson with Astonish co-worker Ryan Kanner. Johnson, 24, of Providence, earned a degree from JWU last year in graphic design and digital media. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO
NEW SCHOOL APPROACH: Web designer Maya Johnson with Astonish co-worker Ryan Kanner. Johnson, 24, of Providence, earned a degree from JWU last year in graphic design and digital media. / PBN PHOTO/MICHAEL SALERNO

When Wil Hall graduates from Johnson & Wales University’s School of Engineering & Design in May, he has a job waiting at Modo Labs he’ll be familiar with – he is already interning in the position part time.
Hall, 21, is one of a growing number of students developing cutting-edge skills at a JWU school that has redefined itself. Formerly the School of Technology, the School of Engineering & Design has been renamed to reflect its strengths in not only computer-aided design but also in electronic, robotic, network and software engineering, as well as graphic design and digital media, said the school’s dean, Frank Tweedie.
“We’re looking to refine ourselves to be a lot more about the higher-level skill sets as opposed to technology, which is very broad,” said Tweedie. “We felt that name encompassed where we were headed. A lot of the change is driven by where the industry is going.”
Nationally, double-digit growth is expected in computer science, network and software engineering jobs over the next decade, Tweedie said. In design, job growth is already 13-15 percent above where it was in 2008, he said.
“The university has a Centennial strategic plan and the changes in the school meet the needs of that plan to provide excellence in curriculum, faculty and student experience and deliver programs that meet the needs of industry moving forward,” Tweedie said.
The seven degrees the school encompasses include information science; electrical engineering; robotic engineering technology; network engineering; software engineering; engineering design and configuration management; and graphic design and digital media.
Part of the changes includes making some of the degree programs full four-year bachelor’s degrees instead of “2+2” programs where an associate degree is earned in the first two years, and can be developed into a four-year degree, Tweedie said.
“The skill sets of students going out with an associate degree are not at the higher-level industry is looking for,” he said.
The students that graduate from this school are among the highest-paid graduates of JWU, Tweedie said. The school graduates about 120 students a year. The job-placement rate is always in the mid-90s and about five years ago was 100 percent, he added.
The school is also starting students in internships or experiential-learning projects as early as their sophomore year, he added, because employers are looking for the experience, familiarity and soft skills that come with internships. Hall, who will graduate this year with a double major in network and software engineering, has worked in the university’s digital-services department managing mobile solutions. In a project with a nonprofit, he also developed a mobile app that gives guided tours for the Jewish Alliance Rhode Island Holocaust Memorial.
The work impressed staff at Modo Labs, in Boston, which hired him full time, a job that starts after he graduates, and also hired him part time through an internship. Modo Labs provides mobile platforms and support services for universities, businesses and hospitals with campuses, said Robert Mallon, vice president of client services, one of the people who hired Hall.
“He had approached us,” Mallon said, “and the mix of skills he had gotten through his program, the experience he had working for the school and the enthusiasm for the subject matter was really evident. It was just a great match.”
While Mallon had not hired from JWU’s School of Engineering & Design before now, he said in Hall he sees the type of worker emerging that he is looking for: the person who has “come of age in the mobile era,” for whom smartphones are a primary device and second nature to use.
“Mobile is generally taking over as the primary place to get data, so it’s where [these graduates] live,” Mallon said. “The experience they bring to us is really valuable because they have that firsthand perspective.”
An employer who has hired more than one graduate from JWU’s School of Engineering & Design is GTECH Corp. of Providence, the gaming technology provider and operator.
Of some 40 internships offered over the past five years by GTECH to JWU students, 13 have led to the hiring of graduates, said Mark Truman, an architect who oversees advanced research and innovation at GTECH. Of those 13 full-time employees, half have been put into a leadership program called “Developing a Leader.”
“They’re potential leaders of the future at GTECH,” Truman said. “They’ve all been superstars. They’re people who are brought in at entry level fresh out of college and they’re performing a couple of levels above what would be expected from their position.” Jesse Friedman, an adjunct professor in the school, is also a former director of Web and interface development at Astonish of Warwick, a company that provides an insurance marketing and sales platform for local insurance agencies. He hired both Maya Johnson, 24, of Providence, who earned a degree from JWU last year in graphic design and digital media, with a concentration in Web technology, and Ryan Kanner, 22, of Somers, N.Y., who graduated from JWU with a graphic-design and digital-media degree in 2013.
Friedman is also a JWU alumnus, but before he left Astonish, he worked closely as both professor and employer with Johnson and Kanner, developing skills in front-end Web development and design.
“I got to see them transform,” he said. “They both had a really strong knack for what we were doing.”
Relabeling the School of Technology as the School of Engineering and Design hints at the offering of such cutting-edge skills, he said.
“It gives a message to high schools that the university is continuing to grow, which is hard to do, because in this industry things change weekly,” he said. “And in a teaching environment you have to have curriculums set years in advance. But JWU builds a course curriculum around design and engineering in a way that allows it to conform to best practices at that moment.”
Johnson said she participated in an internship at GTECH and a required course called the Design Solutions Team, where the school brings in nonprofits inside JWU’s Feinstein Community Service Center. The nonprofits use the work students do for them for free.
She’s particularly proud of a logo she crafted for the Laotian Community Center of Rhode Island using the Republic of Laos’ national flower, the dok champa. Using the flower was her idea.
Johnson began full-time work at Astonish as a Web developer on Feb. 24, she said. She is learning WordPress, and Sass, a popular tool for creating websites.
“I’d say I’m pretty marketable,” Johnson said. “I was chosen because I did design work as well as coding. Since I got here, I learned even more things to make me a stronger developer. Whenever I move on, I’ll be stronger in [my] skill set and I’ll know how to use more programs, more tools, than I did before.” •

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