College of Applied Science and Technology

Telecommunications Minor

Contact Information:

Introduction:

Who is eligible?

General Policies and Requirements:

1. Only undergraduate matriculated students may enroll in the minor.
   
2. Minor consists of five courses.
   
3. Minor must be at least 20-quarter credit hours in length.
   
4. Students requesting the minor need to have a Minor Authorization Form signed by the Telecommunications Program Chair. The students should submit completed authorization forms to their home department for processing.
   
5. Posting of the minor on a student’s transcript requires a minimum grade point average of 2.0 in the minor courses.
   
6. A minor may not be added after graduation.
   
   

Policies and requirements specific to the telecommunications minor:

Curriculum

Required Courses:

Electives: (Select two of the following)

* Students who have prior knowledge &/or experience but who may not have completed the required prerequisites may take “the” course with the approval of the instructor.

Course Scheduling

Students could complete this minor in 6 quarters or less.

Course Descriptions:

0614-271 Telecommunications Fundamentals
A survey of and introduction to the structure and regulation of the telecommunications industry. The basics of data communications, telephony, switching systems, ISDN, multiplexing, and networks and introduced. Data communications components, codes and techniques are identified. Methods for selecting, implementing and managing a computer network or telephone are reviewed.

0614-465 Voice Communications
This course provides a technical understanding of the local and inter-exchange carrier environments with respect to analog and digital signaling principles, transmission equipment, services and subscriber loop engineering. Private and public telephone systems and networks are studied with respect to POTS, ISDN, digital loop carrier, cellular and traffic analysis. Students may not take both this course and 0614-464 for credit.

0609-466 Voice Communications Lab
This course is offered only on-site at RIT and provides the laboratory component for
material presented in 0614-465 and 0614-464. Day and evening sections are offered
in sequence with offerings of course 0614-465. Distance Learning sections are offered as an intensive weekend lab in conjunction with Distance Learning sections of 0614-464.

0614-464 Signaling, Transmission, and Switching in Voice Communications
This distance learning course provides a technical understanding of the local and interexchange carrier environments with respect to analog and digital signaling principles, transmission equipment, services and subscriber loop engineering. Private and public telephone systems and networks are studied with respect to POTS, ISDN, digital loop carrier, cellular and traffic analysis. This course covers many of the topics in the Voice Communications (0614-465) course without the associated laboratory. Additional topics included in this course are voice over IP networks, computer-telephone integration, digital network signaling, and digital transmission principles. Students are also required to write a research paper.

0614-477 Networking Technologies
Provides a practical study of data communications from the point of the OSI seven-layer and the TCP/IP five layer protocol model. This course covers the operation of the lower four layers in detail by examining some of the foundation laws including Nyquist and Shannon as well as selected protocols. Special emphasis is placed on internetworking, local-area networking and wide-area networking. This course is a problem based course in that students apply the learning to various computer and networking problems. A laboratory ensures a level of networking competency and provides reinforcement of some of the concepts developed in the lecture.

0614-475 Switching Technologies
This course covers narrowband and broadband switching, protocol, transmission, signaling and transport concept used in public and private telecommunications networks. Signaling System #7, frame relay, ATM, SONET, packet and circuit switching fabrics are studied.

0614-480 Telecommunications Policy
This course provides an introductory overview of domestic and international telecommunications policy and issues with special emphasis on domestic policy, regulation and law. Current issues, trends and standards will also be discussed. The course starts with a basic definition of telecommunications and why policy, regulation/deregulation and law are important to understand. It then moves to the history of US telecommunications development with emphasis on the regulatory environment and continues with discussions of current US regulatory policy at the state and federal levels. Current sweeping changes in the regulatory and legal arenas and the move to a new US and world model will be discussed. The importance of standards for domestic and international telecommunications will be studied along with a description of the standards definition process.

Other issues will be raised including privacy, security and the likely future issues and trends. This course involves much reading, discovery as well as collaborative (group) projects.

0614-561 Networking Engineering
This course considers the design of PSTN backbone carrier networks with respect to loss, delay timing and synchronization. Data networks are considered with respect to router placement, addressing space and capacity in the face of various types of modeled traffic.

0614-562 Network Engineering Lab
This course provides the laboratory experience to complement 0614-561 Telecommunications Network Engineering. Routers are configured for IP, various frame relay, and routing protocols over various LAN, WAN and synchronous facilities.

0614-574 Network Planning and Design
This course provides participants with an introduction to the art and science of wide area network design. Various design approaches are introduced and several heuristic design algorithms are utilized. Blocking networks (telephone voice circuit networks) and delay networks (packet) are studied; greater emphasis is placed on delay networks. The course instills in participants the concept that most networks are holistic entities and therefore, piecemeal approaches to their design yield limited results. A design tool called Delite (design lite version) is utilized. The course is taught in a collaborative participatory manner with considerable student interactions as opposed to straight lecture. Whenever possible, real-world examples are utilized to illustrate topics.

0614-479 Network Management
This course provides an intensive overview of the art and science of management of emerged and emerging telecommunications networks. It integrates technical, management and financial aspects of network management with emphasis on defining requirements, identifying methods of proactive measurement as well as providing specific study of the Telecommunications Management Network (TMN) architecture model and interface specifications. The OSI and TMN compliant Network Management Package—NetExpert is used as a real-world reference. Where possible, other real-world examples are utilized to illustrate lecture topics. A case study / team project is researched and presented.

0614-520 Fiber Optic Telecommunications Technology
An introduction to fiber optic telecommunications technology. Review of basic optics including ray, wave and quantum optics. Light propagation through multi-mode and single-mode fiber. Attenuation, dispersion and nonlinear effects. Introduction to optical components used in communications systems including light emitting diodes, laser diodes, photodiodes and passive optical components. Optical amplifiers and wave division multiplexing. Emphasis on reading and understanding manufacturers’ data sheets for fiber and optical devices.