Double Degree in Computational Engineering

Starting in the fall semester 2008, students of Computational Engineering can obtain a double Master’s degree from two leading European universities. Students who wish to use the opportunity must study one year at each of FAU Erlangen-Nürnberg and Kungl. Tekniska Högskolan, Stockholm, Sweden. According to the agreement between the universities, both universities will award the candidate a master’s degree, giving the graduates an important extra qualification for the international job market.
The study program is essentially symmetric. Students from FAU can, following successful completion of first year’s study, move to KTH, and Swedish students can complete their second year in Erlangen. The first year program at the “home” university covers advanced basics of Computational Engineering, and the second year at the “Guest” university is devoted to depth in a choice of specializations, and to the writing of the Master’s thesis.
The programs at KTH and FAU are international and the instructional language is English. At least for the study, no further language skills are required, with the result that a large percentage of the students are from third countries. The DAAD academic mobility funding agency supports the double degree program with travel grants and scholarships for participating students. In the near future it will also be defined how the double degree can be combined with participation in BGCE and the graduation “with honours”.
Acknowledging the need for highly trained personnel in the area of CSE, both in industry and in academia, Master Courses in CSE were introduced by the two partner universities independently as early as 1997. The two universities therefore belong to the first pioneers of this new field in Europe. However, both institutions did not only initiate the systematic CSE education in Europe, but they have been continuously active in the further development of CSE education. The continuous adaptation is essential because of the rapid evolution in this exciting new branch of science.

What is CSE? Why CSE?

The demand for CSE skills is driven by the remarkable development of large scale computing into the third paradigm of science, where computing complements theory and experiment to become a third fundamental approach to scientific discovery. With computer simulations and optimization of mathematical models this multi-disciplinary field has been established as a new discipline. CSE offers scientists new insight in scientific problems and tools for extracting and using detailed information from volumes of data. CSE has enabled drastic shortening and economization of the design cycle for products and processes, and virtual prototyping is used successfully by aerospace, automotive, and processing industries, as well as in medical technology.
For the students participating in the program, a notably high measure of flexibility and mobility may be assumed. The program strongly encourages leaving well-trodden paths in favor of venturing into the new and unknown. Students will also become effectively tri-lingual, in the everyday life sense, in German, Swedish, and English, in addition to their mother tongue. Through the study program they achieve mastery of a number of the disciplines involved in CSE and become an interesting resource for industrial partners. Many firms have seen the potential of early promotion of their specific applications and take the opportunity to form close ties with highly qualified future collaborators.
Such promotion is of special interest for corporations with activities in Sweden and Germany and in the home countries of the participating students. Internships, thesis projects, and scholarships open the door for the companies to human resource management by ways of scientific collaboration with academia, and for graduates to exciting careers in industry.

Contact

For further information concerning the CE Elite program in Erlangen, please give us a mail:

You will find more information about this program on the web page of the KTH-FAU double master degree program.