Quick Facts:
In the last year alone, the number of PSM programs grew 33 percent; the first program was started in 1997.
Faculty And Staff
Best Practices for PSM Program Directors and their Programs
Resources
National Professional Science Masters Association – at www.npsma.org. Director is Mr. Stephen Lemire, 508-831-4996 and slemire@npsma.org. This organization has a listserv for program directors that will be very helpful to you in sharing experiences with other program directors.
Two other important sources of information about PSM programs can be found at:
- Council of Graduate Schools - http://www.cgsnet.org/Default.aspx?tabid=227.
- Information can also be found at www.sciencemasters.com.
Best Practices with regard to PSMs
Program Leadership
- Attend the PSM statewide meetings and PSM national meetings, when it is feasible, so that you can meet other faculty who are working on these programs and share experiences and knowledge
- Serve as the representative of your program to your own administration and also to the state, employers and to the national organizations that showcase PSM programs. Program directors should be provided with release time (one course per semester is typical) for their administrative activities.
- Identify those attributes of the curriculum that are special to the PSM programs and determine metrics for assessment, so that you can make the case that your students are getting both technical and professional skills in the PSM
- Track your alums to determine if they get jobs and if they eventually work for a Florida employer; keep this information every year
- Please review the curriculum regularly to ensure that it is current and meets the needs of employers
- Ensure that courses are scheduled that are needed for the program
- Create a student organization to support the program and seek SGA funds for support of the program and its students
- Assign someone to coordinate the internships for the students
- Conduct exit interviews with the students and incorporate their suggestions into program changes
- Hold social events and other events, such as project presentations, so that employers and students, prospective students, and alumni can talk with each other and share activities
Faculty Buy-in and Benefits to Faculty
- Extol the benefits of PSM programs to the faculty
- Include in the program some laboratory experience to enable faculty to get papers written and students to get practical lab experience and provide credit for the experience – 3 to 4 sch would be helpful to faculty and students alike
- PSM programs will increase enrollment and you can generally offer more courses; enrollment increases can lead to more faculty hiring, enabling the program to cover more specialization areas
- Hold a retreat of program faculty and advisory board to get various stakeholders together to discuss the PSM
- Invite the President and Provost and your Graduate Dean to meetings with employers and with your Advisory Board and get them to publicly support the PSM programs
Activities with your Advisory Board
- Hold an employer workshop each year to go over the curriculum and other aspects of the program to ensure the program is meeting the needs of employers
- Invite in outside consultants or employers to get feedback on PSM programs and how they work and how they can be improved
- Do not approach your advisory board for funding; they are there to advise. Have your advisory board regularly meet with students about their studies
- Have students talk directly to the advisory board
- List advisory board members on your website
- Include alumni information on your PSM program website
- Invite employers for program seminars, project presentation, tours of the university and your laboratories, visit them in person
Finances of PSMs
- Charge a “program” fee or “surcharge” fee for the program to enable you to have the funding to deliver the “plus” courses. Consider operating the programs through your Continuing Ed unit.
- Share “plus” courses with the other state universities, but also consider sharing technical courses.
- Seek paid internships for students to offset costs of program
Recruiting PSMs
- Have a separate website for the PSM program and link to other department programs; these programs should be easy to find and easily identifiable
- Update your brochure when feasible. The Florida PSM Initiative will provide you with a program brochure at no cost, as well as printed brochures. Please keep these up-to-date
Shared online professional “plus” courses that are available from Florida institutions
The Florida Council of Graduate Deans is committed to sharing professional content courses among our campuses. This sharing is meant to reduce unnecessary duplications while making it feasible for us to develop these PSM programs. It is envisioned that some of these professional content courses will be online, while other courses will be available in hybrid and other formats. The following universities have online professional courses that can be incorporated into our PSM programs:
Find where your program is being offered
University Name
Location
PSM Programs offered
Industry Sectors
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Biotechnology
Florida’s biotechnology industry employs 37,000 people and ranks tenthin the United State in the number of biotechnology companies (50). The biotechnology industry has grown from $8 billion in revenues to $39 billion in revenues in the last decade. Over 800,000 people in the U.S. are employed in the industry this year. In 2015 it is estimated that there will be a five-fold increase in the number of workers employed in this industry. The biotechnology industry spent $18 billion on research and development in 2003, primarily for salaries of scientists trained in biotechnology. The state of Florida has pursued the biotechnology industry aggressively, creating two bioscience-oriented centers of excellence and providing incentives for both Scripps Research and Burnham Institutes to come to Florida. It is expected that the state will develop an additional 40,000 jobs in biotechnology. Recent advertisements for employment as research assistants at the Scripps Research Institute and the Burnham Institute have focused on individuals with experience in molecular biology and protein chemistry. Starting salaries are listed from $42,000 to $60,000. There are eight programs including Bioinformatics and Computational Biology, Pharmaceutical Chemistry, and biotechnology that are planned for this industry sector. View programs.
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Environmental/Sustainability
The United States spent $200 billion annually on environmental, supporting 2.5 million jobs. Florida is one of the top five states in terms of environmental/conservation employment. The Florida Agency for Workforce Innovation estimates that 336 PhD life scientists are needed in central Florida by 2009 to support adequate labor for solving critical conservation problems in Florida. The U.S. Bureau of Labor estimates that over 15,000 PhD biological scientists are needed nationally by 2010. Due to this overwhelming need, the State University System of Florida plans on offering eight PSM degree programs which will include programs such as Environmental Science, Environmental Sustainability and GIS, and Environmental Science of Construction Management. View programs.
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Forensics/Homeland Security
Forensic Science is a newly developing field that has become more critical in the last two years with the greater emphasis on Homeland Security. Managers at government laboratories in the U.S. are now required to have a master's degree. As the number of crimes solved using DNA evidence and the number of terrorism incidents increase, forensic scientists who are well educated in the scientific bases of forensic science are in high demand. The four planned PSM programs will produce graduates that will fill this need. These will include programs such as Cyber and Information Security, Digital Forensics, and Forensic Science. View programs.
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Healthcare
The demand for healthcare information professionals will increase by 40,000 jobs, if current trends are followed (Yeager, 2008). The demand for Health Care Informatics professionals is growing not just in the United States, but also internationally. More than 6,000 health informatics positions are available each year and only 2,600 graduates are entering the field (American Health Information Management Association, 2007). There will also be a demand for people with expertise in health information technology. The six planned PSM degree programs include topics such as Health Informatics, Medical Informatics, and Healthcare Informatics and Cytogenetics/Genetic Counseling. View programs.
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Simulation/Aviation
Central Florida has long been the nation’s epicenter for Modeling, Simulation and Training (MS&T) activity with all military services represented and significant research and development and academic resources at the University of Central Florida. The Florida High Tech Corridor has the largest cluster of MS&T companies in the entire U.S., with more than 2,500 organizations doing business in the public and private sectors, employing more than 36,000 people and with a total payroll that exceeds $2.1 billion. The average annual salary of simulation employees is about $70,000. View programs.
"The cooperative agreements our university
faculty forge with industry will provide important opportunities for students to learn and practice in real-world settings. PSM programs will help students become highly skilled professionals who benefit our industries with research, development, and early-stage manufacturing skills. Graduates from the programs will be ready to serve as our future innovators and leaders of industry."
Chris Hart
President, Workforce Florida, Inc.
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