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The Next Wave
The Management and Technology Program is not standing
still these days, to be sure. Hamilton and Weber are particularly
concerned with raising its profile among prospective
candidates. To that end, M&T will host high-school students
on campus for the summer of 2005, exposing them to
a three-week, four-credit course on the principles of management
and engineering.
"High school students don’t have a good sense of what
they might be studying when they take engineering in college,
not to mention business," said Weber. "They might
say, 'Yeah, business seems interesting. I have an uncle doing
something.’ But they need a solid sense of what they will
be offered. This will also serve as a way to get the word out
about the M&T program."
In addition, Hamilton wants to get alumni more involved
in networking and even coming back to campus to mentor
students. There are now 1,400 M&T alumni, a great number
of whom are already leaders in their fields. They are listed
in data base of the program’s new website, www.mandt.
wharton.upenn.edu.
"We’re really looking to nurture the community at the
alumni level," said Weber. "Alumni do want to stay connected
and support the program, and we want to make it easy for
them to do so."
Weber is a perfect example of that. He has been a consultant,
technologist, partner, and investor in a series of technology
companies, and now is a partner in a Philadelphia
consulting firm, Antiphony, which he said is a musical term
that grows from the give and take of ideas. He is also an angel
investor in emerging tech firms through his firm, Robin
Hood Ventures.
Yet he spends about a third of his time with the M&T
program, teaching courses on technological innovation and
management.
"Teaching gives me the opportunity to talk to the youngest
of the best innovators around, which complements the
consulting, which I am doing with larger companies, and
with Robin Hood, where I get to work with start-up companies,"
he said. "It covers a whole range of things, so I want to
stay involved with the program."
Not Even the Sky is the Limit
If M&T wanted to make a billboard, though, it might
choose Garrett E. Reisman, who graduated in the five-year
M&T program in 1990. Reisman went to Cal Tech for his
Masters and Ph.D. in mechanical engineering and then
worked at TRW in its space and technology division. In
1998, he became an astronaut.
"Like most kids, I didn’t have a clue what I wanted to
do when I applied to college. But I had a great high school
physics teacher, and when I saw I could get an engineering
degree and learn about business, too, I knew this was for
me," said Reisman, who grew up in Parsippany, in northern
New Jersey.
During his fifth year Reisman realized that his training
might enable him to become a mission specialist. "I thought,
'Well, this might not happen, but it’s a possibility.’ Now here
I am," he said. He was speaking by phone from Star City, the
longtime home of Russian space flight, where he was training
for his first space mission. He had just been at the gym,
where his locker is two away from that of Yuri Gagarin, the
first man in space.
"They keep the locker like a museum, with his shoes and
towel and all," said Reisman, his voice rising in awe. "This
place was super-secret back in Soviet days. It’s just exciting
to have a job like this.
"Had I not gone to M&T and not studied with people
like Professor Hamilton, this couldn’t have happened. There
was nothing like it to compare. My engineering training
was unparalleled, and knowing business has helped me immensely
in evaluating projects at NASA, which is what astronauts
do when not on specific missions," he said. "With
engineering and business degrees, the program is far from
limiting. They are two of the biggest strengths at Penn.
M&T students are lucky to come out with such a great array
of options—like even being an astronaut."
Robert Strauss is a frequent contributor to the Wharton Alumni
Magazine.
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