Systems Engineering is an interdisciplinary approach and means to enable the realization of successful systems. It focuses on defining customer needs and required functionality early in the development cycle, documenting requirements, then proceeding with design synthesis and system validation while considering the complete problem:
Systems Engineering integrates all the disciplines and specialty groups into a team effort forming a structured development process that proceeds from concept to production to operation. Systems Engineering considers both the business and the technical needs of all customers with the goal of providing a quality product that meets the user needs.
INCOSE - the International Council on Systems Engineering - is the world's premier engineering professional society for enabling holistic solutions to problems and needs. Its members are practicing systems engineers and people interested in the engineering of systems. INCOSE has almost 50 local chapters in at least a dozen countries around the world.
SCC is the Space Coast Chapter of INCOSE. The Chapter has members drawn primarily from the "Space Coast" area of the eastern seaboard of central Florida. The SCC is an active chapter, with regular monthly technical meetings with a wide variety of discussion topics. The Chapter's "members" are members of INCOSE who are in good standing, and who have elected the Space Coast Chapter as their "home" chapter, no matter where they live or work. Both members and guests are welcome at our monthly meetings.
As a registered chapter of INCOSE, SCC has its own Charter (PDF, 7 pages). As stated in the charter, the Purpose of the Chapter is "to foster the definition, understanding, and practice of world class systems engineering in industry, academia, and government.". Also as stated in the charter, the Objectives of the Chapter are "to provide a focal point for dissemination of systems engineering knowledge, and through its involvement with the COUNCIL [i.e., INCOSE] to:
Chapter technical meetings are normally held on the first Thursday of every month, on the F.I.T. campus in Melbourne, Florida., from 5:30 PM to about 7:00 PM. Meeting announcements are usually sent by email to all chapter members and anyone on the "Friends" list. Additionally, the dates and descriptions of the next few meetings are posted on this web site.
The SCC is one of the many local chapters of INCOSE in the United States; in Florida alone there are two other chapters - one in the Orlando area and one in the Tampa/St. Petersburgh area. The Links page contains links to the web pages of these two chapters, and to the main INCOSE site; links to the web pages of other chapters around the world are available through the INCOSE site.