Professional Science Master's Degree
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PROFESSIONAL SCIENCE MASTER'S (PSM) DEGREE PROGRAMS
A Professional Science Master's (PSM) is an innovative graduate degree program that typically consists of two years of academic training in an emerging or interdisciplinary area of science, mathematics, or technology. The PSM degree program also contains a professional component that may include internships and "cross-training" in business, project management, and communications. PSM degree programs are developed in concert with industry and are designed to dovetail into present and future professional career opportunities.
The PSM degree program was created in response to industry’s demand for employees with sophisticated scientific, mathematical, and technological skills combined with a core business education. PSM degree program students and graduates are a new breed of scientists specifically trained to meet employers’ needs. The industry-responsive graduate programs are fueled by ongoing input and support from companies involved in local employer advisory boards, internships and/or research projects where students have the opportunity to apply their academic training to real world challenges. Many of these companies hire PSM graduates.
PSM STUDENTS AND GRADUATES
More than half of the current 2600 PSM degree program students concentrate their studies in the biosciences, making it one of the most popular disciplines in this respected graduate degree program. Students are attracted to the diversity and innovation of the burgeoning biosciences field where many of the 2100 PSM degree program graduates have found employment. Nearly half of the students are already working in industry and are supported by their employer to meet internal needs.
Students earning Professional Science Master’s degrees find employment in fields such as biotech, the chemical industries, entrepreneurship, the financial sector, food safety, forensics, health care, higher education, medical laboratories, the nuclear industry, the pharmaceutical industry, and water treatment facilities. Other graduates find employment in environmental and government agencies as well as in the various branches of the US armed forces.
PSM EMPLOYERS
PSM degree programs are located across the United States, allowing employers to align their geographic recruitment goals and workforce development strategies with highly customized and effective university training that can contribute substantially to industry’s hiring and internal recruitment efforts.
Notable employers that have hired graduates from a minimum of four different PSM degree programs are listed here. These are preliminary findings of the NPSMA 2010 Roster of Employers (see below).
Abbott, Amgen, Baxter Healthcare, Chevron Oil, Eli Lilly & Co., Genentech, Glaxo Smith-Kline, Lockheed Martin, Merck, Novartis, Pfizer, Roche, and Watson-Wyatt & Co.
PSM DISCIPLINES
The first PSM degree programs appeared in the late 1990s. Today there are more than 140 PSM degree programs offered at over 70 colleges and universities [1]. Fields of study within PSM degree programs include, but are not limited to:
Agricultural Production, Analytical Chemistry, Applied Genomics, Applied Physics, Applied Statistics, Biochemistry, Bioinformatics, Biology, Biotechnology, Cell and Molecular Biology, Computer Information Systems, Computational Sciences, Entrepreneurial Sciences, Environmental Sciences, Financial Mathematics, Food Safety, Forensic Sciences, Geographic Information Systems, Geosciences, Health Care Informatics, Health Physics, Industrial Chemistry, Industrial Mathematics, Industrial Physics, Marine Biology, Materials and Chemical Synthesis, Medical Physics, Microbiology, Pharmacology, and Toxicology.
History
In 1997, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation [2] began issuing competitive grants for the planning and implementation of Professional Science Masters degree programs under the umbrella of their Science Education program. The initiative was developed by Jesse Ausubel and Michael S. Teitelbaum who continues to oversee the award process as program director.
Concurrent with this effort, the W. M. Keck Foundation [3] built an all-new master's-only graduate school designed to educate leaders for the biotechnology, pharmaceutical, healthcare product and biosciences industries. The resulting Keck Graduate Institute (KGI) of Applied Life Sciences [4] enrolled its first class of 28 students in August 2000.
In 2001, a Sloan Foundation grant to the Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) [5] extended the PSM initiative to master's-focused institutions. The CGS sponsors bi-annual conferences for the PSM academic community and, through its government relations division, promotes the PSM to national leaders and policy makers as a key component of American graduate education.
In November 2005, a call for volunteers to explore the establishment of a professional association to represent the various PSM constituents was greeted with enthusiasm. A steering committee composed of program directors and administrators successfully applied to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation for an officer’s grant, thus setting the groundwork for the development of the association.
National Professional Science Master's Association (NPSMA)
The National Professional Science Master's Association (NPSMA) [6] is a collaborative of Professional Science Master's (PSM) degree program directors, faculty, administrators, alumni, and students that supports PSM degree program initiatives. It engages businesses, industries, nonprofit organizations, government agencies, and professional associations in the development of PSM degree programs and with internship and job placement for PSM degree program students and graduates.
In July 2007, the NPSMA was awarded a development grant by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, bylaws were adopted, and the first board of directors elected. Bogdan Vernescu, professor and head of Worcester Polytechnic Institute’s (WPI) Mathematical Sciences Department, served as the first president of the NPSMA from July 2007 through December 2008. Stephen J. Lemire has been the executive director since October 2007.
In addition to Vernescu, the other founding board members were Ursula Bechert, Dave Bieber, Lisbeth Borbye, Jung Choi, Loida Escote-Carlson, Elizabeth Friedman, Alaina Levine, and Peiru Wu.
The NPSMA has a national Advisory Board of leaders in academia, industry, and graduate education who further the connection between universities and employers supporting PSM degree programs.
National Policy
In The American COMPETES Act of 2007, signed into law by President George Bush, Congress authorized the National Science Foundation (NSF) to develop a new program of grants to help four-year institutions create or expand PSM degree programs. This followed on the heels of the National Academies [7] publication of Rising above the Gathering Storm: Energizing and Employing America for a Brighter Economic Future [8].
In its 2008 report Science Professionals: Master's Education for a Competitive World [9], the National Research Council (NRC) endorsed PSM degree programs, stating that policymakers, universities, and employers should work together to speed the development of professionally oriented master's degree programs in the natural sciences. Graduates of these programs, which build both scientific knowledge and practical workplace skills, can make a strong contribution to the nation's competitiveness, according to the committee that wrote the report.
Recently, PSM degree programs have been included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. The stimulus bill signed by President Barack Obama allocates $15 million for PSM degree programs to be administered by the National Science Foundation.