AMD NextGen Engineer
Corporate executives, leading academics, and engineering students acknowledge that education solely focused on technical excellence does not completely prepare engineers to develop innovative solutions to critical challenges. As a technology company tackling numerous challenges on behalf of our customers and the industry, AMD’s engineers are often required to work on teams that cross multiple time zones, cultures, languages, and disciplines. Therefore, it is imperative that they have the breadth of education that prepares them to work in a highly dispersed global environment.
At AMD, we believe that high-impact, multidisciplinary learning results in a robust and well-prepared workforce. Our NextGen Engineer initiative fuses real world, multidisciplinary learning with the technical excellence taught in undergraduate and graduate engineering programs to help prepare engineers as global leaders
and innovators. By working together with academia, students, government, and industry, engineering education can align classroom learning with real world situations to help meet the needs of both society and industry.
Given the rapid pace of innovation, we also recognize that preparing engineers to be lifelong learners is essential. Vibrant learning experiences can and should take place in both formal and informal academic and corporate settings. As such, AMD is committed to nurturing our own technical talent as part of the continuum of STEM education that starts early and continues throughout an engineer’s professional lifetime.
The Next Generation
The need for engineering education that is engaging, relevant and multidisciplinary goes beyond the needs of AMD and our industry. While engineers are required to help solve the most significant global, environmental, and social challenges of our time, fewer than 40% of U.S. students who enter college intending to major in a science, technology, engineering or math (STEM) field actually complete a STEM degree. (Report to the President, Engage to Excel: Producing One Million Additional College Graduates with Degrees in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, February 2012.) Improvements in the education system are essential if the U.S. is to remain internationally competitive and continue to excel in preparing a technical workforce for an increasingly knowledge‐intensive economy. (The Competitiveness and Innovative Capacity of the United States, U.S. Department of Commerce, in consultation with the National Economic Council, January 2012.) thus, companies and academia must work together to close the gaps that currently stand in the way of adequately preparing the next generation of engineers.
AMD’s Involvement
To address these challenges, AMD has collaborated with leading organizations and programs whose interests align with AMD NextGen Engineer. These include:
Our commitment to the STEM learning continuum
AMD has created a range of strategic initiatives to prepare and inspire future and current engineers:
- AMD Changing the Game, the signature program of the AMD Foundation, uses the power of digital-game design to excite and engage middle and high school students in STEM education;
- AMD NextGen Engineer fuses real world, multidisciplinary learning into the undergraduate and graduate engineering experience to prepare new engineers to lead in our industry;
- AMD Technical Staff and Leadership Development programs apply best-in-class academic approaches to enable our current engineering talent to innovate and work together more effectively on complex global business and social challenges.