Faculty Internship in Industry

Based on the authors' experience at Middle Tennessee State University (MTSU), an effective way for members of engineering technology faculties to keep abreast of new developments in their field is to establish a faculty internship programme. The internship programme at MTSU, fully supported by the university's industrial advisory council, is set up to be a very simple and paper-free process. Every semester one faculty member spends the entire semester working as an engineer at a local firm and continues to draw his or her normal salary from the university. The firm, in turn, reimburses the university for the cost of replacing the faculty member with an adjunct. Since the faculty member is employed as a contractor in the host company, he or she retains the employment benefits from the university.