Celebrating 175: Spotlight on Golisano College of Computing and Information Sciences

Blogging. Gigabytes. Wi-Fi. These are the newest buzzwords in the age of computers. Here’s something else in the computer world that’s abuzz—the B. Thomas Golisano College of Computing and Information Sciences. As RIT celebrates its 175th anniversary, GCCIS—the largest college of its kind in the nation—has a lot of milestones to celebrate from its three-year history.

One of the main reasons, according to Jorge Díaz-Herrera, dean of GCCIS, is that RIT is leading computing education reform—something that other universities are noticing.

“This college is making a serious attempt to tell the world that computing is a lot more than computer science,” he says.

Díaz-Herrera indicates that, for the first time in 10 years, the National Academy of Sciences has changed the definition of computer science to mean computing and information sciences.

“This, of course, happens to be the name of our college, and when I saw this I thought it was fantastic. This is giving credence to what we are doing here.”

Students work on projects in one of 21 information technology labs within GCCIS.

The breadth of programs offered in GCCIS is another reason the college is getting noticed.
“There was a vision for the creation of this college, bringing together a mosaic of programs that all complement each other. And the programs all center around the idea of computing and information sciences,” says Díaz-Herrera.

The three departments within GCCIS are information technology, software engineering and computer science, with a total of 92 faculty members—a number that Díaz-Herrera says is unprecedented. Their expertise allows the college to offer four undergraduate and four graduate programs. And several more master’s degree programs are in development, including learning and knowledge management, game design and development, human-computer interaction, networking and systems administration, and software engineering.

Research is also a draw for students. In the fall, the college created the Center for Advancing the Study of Cyberinfrastructure. The center aims to foster interdisciplinary research, using state-of-the-art computing to make studies more productive in engineering and scientific fields, including social sciences and the humanities. Several of RIT’s colleges are participating in the center’s research. One area is social computing—making RIT the first academic institution to offer research about social interaction at both the graduate and undergraduate levels.

The center will be the research arm of a doctoral program that GCCIS is developing. The program will mirror the constitution of the college, offering a broad base with specializations in infrastructure, interaction and informatics. Once it receives approval, the doctoral program will accept eight to 10 students each year.
In January, GCCIS will commemorate RIT’s 175 years with a series of lectures, a computing trade show and the college’s first-ever conference on computing and information sciences. And this is sure to get some buzz—faculty, staff and students will showcase not their computer skills, but acting skills. They will act in a stage production, Computer Security.