Services
Consulting for computing programs
and the people who run them.
We work with colleges and universities to start new computing programs, get them accredited, fund them, and keep students in them through graduation.
Our experience
We work with public and private institutions, especially HBCUs, minority-serving institutions, and community colleges. We work with deans, academic leaders, and program directors who need to start a computing program, get through a specialized or regional accreditation review, set up assessment, bring in funding, or improve retention and job placement. Everything we recommend comes from more than twenty years of doing this work at a university: leading a department, teaching cybersecurity, serving as an external accreditation evaluator, and mentoring faculty and students.
What we do
We design new computing programs in data science, cybersecurity, software engineering, AI, and newer fields. We build the curriculum, prepare the state approval package, and get the program ready for specialized or regional accreditation review. That includes mapping the program to the criteria, preparing the self-study and the evidence, aligning assessment with the outcomes, and running a mock review before the real visit.
Results
We have taken computing and cybersecurity programs through at least six accreditation cycles, including external review, and started four new degree programs. A fifth, in artificial intelligence, is under review.
What we do
We set up the assessment your program needs. We write the student learning outcomes, set a schedule for collecting evidence, and build the process that turns what you find into changes to the courses. We also prepare programs for state-level program review.
Results
We built the assessment systems for three computing programs. Each one shows what students are learning and where the program needs to change.
What we do
We help you build hands-on learning that starts before students enroll and continues until they are hired. That means early exposure programs for high school students, transfer partnerships with community colleges, course projects built around problems employers bring you, and internship and apprenticeship placements with those employers. Over time, your institution becomes the place employers in your region go to when they need computing graduates.
Results
A $999,000 NSF ExLENT award (Experiential Learning for Emerging and Novel Technologies) and a USM Elkins Academic Transformation Professorship funded our Experiential Learning Center, where computing students get hands-on project work and career preparation.
What we do
We write grant proposals for federal, state, and institutional funding. Most of our proposal work supports student scholarships, retention programs, and the labs, centers, and partnerships that prepare students for the workforce.
Results
We have brought in more than $5 million in external funding, including NSF CyberCorps® Scholarship for Service, NSF ExLENT, and Henry Luce Foundation support. We also serve on NSF review panels, so we know how reviewers read a proposal.
What we do
We help you keep the students you enroll and graduate more of them. We look at where students leave and why, then work with your faculty and advisors on the changes that address it. We also design outreach that brings more women and underrepresented students into computing, and we set up the steps that move graduates into jobs.
Results
In the department we led, enrollment grew from 219 to more than 500 students over five years, and the number of women enrolled went from 20 to 163.
What we do
We build the relationships with employers and government agencies that turn into internships, apprenticeships, and jobs for your students. We also set up the career preparation that gets students ready for those openings.
Results
Our partnerships with universities, government agencies, and companies have placed computing students in internships and technology jobs. The New York Times covered this work.
What we do
We coach new academic leaders through their first year: the budget, hiring, working with the dean’s office, and the decisions a new leader has to make early. That includes the political side of the job: who decides what, how the dean’s and provost’s offices work, how to handle disagreements among faculty, and how to get a decision made and carried out. We mentor tenure-track faculty from their first year to the tenure decision, covering the research record, teaching, service, and the tenure dossier itself. We help students who want an academic career plan their graduate study. Institutions hire us for this work, and so do individual academic leaders and faculty members.
Results
In the department we led, the number of faculty research labs doubled. We have coached incoming academic leaders through their first years in the role, and our mentoring of faculty and students received the USM Mentoring Award.
Results
What this work
has produced.
- 01
At least six accreditation cycles led across computing and cybersecurity programs, alongside service as an external accreditation evaluator.
- 02
Four new bachelor’s programs: Data Science, Software Engineering, Cyber Operations Engineering, and Virtual Reality and Gaming. A fifth, in Artificial Intelligence, is under review.
- 03
Assessment systems built for three computing programs, each showing what students are learning and where the program needs to change.
- 04
More than $5 million in external funding, including NSF CyberCorps® Scholarship for Service, NSF ExLENT, and Henry Luce Foundation support.
- 05
A $999,000 NSF ExLENT award and a USM Elkins Academic Transformation Professorship, which funded an Experiential Learning Center for computing students.
- 06
Women enrolled in computing up from 20 to 163.
- 07
Led a department whose enrollment grew from 219 to more than 500 students over five years.
- 08
Partnerships with universities, government agencies, and companies that place computing students in internships and technology jobs. The New York Times covered this work.
- 09
Incoming academic leaders coached through their first years in the role, and faculty and student mentoring recognized with the USM Mentoring Award.
Next step
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