Cracking the Code on Stem: A People Strategy for Nevada\u27s Economy

Nevada has in place a plausible economic diversification strategy—and it’s beginning to work. Now, the state and its regions need to craft a people strategy. Specifically, the state needs to boost the number of Nevadans who possess at least some postsecondary training in the fields of science, technology, engineering, or math—the so-called “STEM” disciplines (to which some leaders add arts and design to make it “STEAM”). The moment is urgent—and only heightened by the projected worker needs of Tesla Motors’ planned “gigafactory” for lithium-ion batteries in Storey County. Even before the recent Tesla commitment, a number of the more high-tech industry sectors targeted by the state’s new economic diversification strategy had begun to deliver significant growth. Most notable in fast-growing sectors like Business IT Ecosystems (as defined by the Governor’s Office for Economic Development) and large sectors like Health and Medical Services, this growth has begun to increase the demand in Nevada for workers with at least a modicum of postsecondary training in one or more STE M discipline. However, there is a problem. Even though many available opportunities require no more than the right community college certificate, insufficient numbers of Nevadans have pursued even a little STEM training. As a result, too few Nevadans are ready to participate in the state’s emerging STEM economy. The upshot: Without concerted action to prepare more Nevadans for jobs in STEM-intensive fields, skills shortages could limit growth in the state’s most promising target industries and Nevadans could miss out on employment that offers superior paths to opportunity and advancement. Which is the challenge this report addresses: Aimed at focusing the state at a critical moment, this analysis speaks to Nevada’s STEM challenge by providing a new assessment of Nevada’s STEM economy and labor market as well as a review of actions that leaders throughout the state—whether in the public, private, civic, or philanthropic sectors—can take to develop a workforce capable of supporting continued growth through economic diversification

Ready for Tomorrow: Demand-Side Emerging Skills for the 21st Century

As part of the Ready for the Job demand-side skill assessment, the Heldrich Center explored emerging work skills that will affect New Jersey's workforce in the next three to five years. The Heldrich Center identified five specific areas likely to generate new skill demands: biotechnology, security, e-learning, e-commerce, and food/agribusiness. This report explores the study's findings and offers recommendations for improving education and training in New Jersey

Spacecraft software training needs assessment research, appendices

The appendices to the previously reported study are presented: statistical data from task rating worksheets; SSD references; survey forms; fourth generation language, a powerful, long-term solution to maintenance cost; task list; methodology; SwRI's instructional systems development model; relevant research; and references

An Employment-Oriented Definition of the Information Systems Field: An Educator\u27s View

Defining information systems has been a longstanding problem for the field. This paper suggests that, since it may not be possible to develop a universal definition, consideration should be given to a plurality of definitions aligned toward specific purposes. As an implementation of this approach it recommends the following shorter definition for the purpose of education, which emphasizes topics that are being or will be taught to prepare students for employment in the field: Information systems is the field that prepares students to interface between non-technical organizational employees and managers and very technical IT professionals, with a focus on functions that are unlikely to be offshored. It includes general categories of information and communications technology use that currently and/or will employ substantial numbers of employees in organizations. The more detailed definition presented in the body of the paper extends this by identifying five broad subcategories that currently fit within the above definition

User-is Partnership And Is Development Success

Since 1970, high project failure rate and low user satisfaction has elicited research on users and their role in the process. It is believed that users\u27 physical participation or psychological involvement in the development process can improve user satisfaction and/or system quality. Previous research treats users as a source of requirements and hypothesizes satisfaction to increase when requirements are fulfilled. However, inconsistent conclusions lead to confusion. Recently, a co-production concept has been proposed to understand consumer participation in product development process. In this reconceptualization, users, instead of requirement generator, should be part of the production. In this study, based on co-production concept, we view users as one knowledge source and study how knowledge can be coordinated through the co-production process. After collecting data from 97 system users, most of the hypothesized relationships have been confirmed. IS-user co-production has a positive effect on expertise coordination and, in turn, improves teamwork outcomes. The only relationship that is not significant is between bring expertise to bear and creativity. Implications for practitioner and suggestion for future research are provided. Co-production was found to be a second-order construct comprised of multiple formative constructs. Higher levels of coproduction behavior were expected and were found to produce better outcomes of collaborative efforts. For future study, this relationship is expected to hold true when pairs of information systems developers and information systems users who have worked together on the same information systems development project are surveyed at the end of their projects (or just before it ends or recently thereafter)

A gentle transition from Java programming to Web Services using XML-RPC

Exposing students to leading edge vocational areas of relevance such as Web Services can be difficult. We show a lightweight approach by embedding a key component of Web Services within a Level 3 BSc module in Distributed Computing. We present a ready to use collection of lecture slides and student activities based on XML-RPC. In addition we show that this material addresses the central topics in the context of web services as identified by Draganova (2003)