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Unique perspective on Academic Equivalency: Corina White, CSEP

Sep 08, 2022
Mrunmayi Joshi
Here is an interview with Corina White of Naval Postgraduate School which talks about her experience and perspective as a systems engineering professor who chose to use the academic equivalency program to get INCOSE certified. Happy SEPtember!

Corina White

This interview was conducted in 2022. 

Q1. What is your current role/position?

» I am a Systems Engineering Professor.

Q2. What are your next career goals?

» I would like to become a lead subject matter expert in competency model development and competency assessment tools. These efforts can promote, retain and develop the workforce. I would also like to develop or join a platform that connects with graduate/undergraduate HBCU programs to incorporate these tools to create learning objectives and assessment tools for students to start developing these competencies. I plan to also contribute significantly to teaching and research efforts focused on using a model based systems engineering approach to digital engineering.

Q3. What have you learned about systems engineering in school?

» Systems Engineering is summarized as taking a holistic view of the system of interest. It is making an effort to understand the big picture including the mission, customer's needs and requirements in the beginning. It is trying to understand all the different parts of the system and how they interact with each other to perform a specific function.

Q4. What motivated you to get SEP certification?

» We motivate our students to apply for SEP certification through the academic equivalency program if they qualify and never considered applying for it myself. Through encouraging them I also encouraged myself.

Q5. How did the academic equivalency program benefit you?

» I am a mother of three, active duty military spouse, leadership program participant, teaching fellows’ participant and I contribute significantly to several research projects. I am balancing quite as most working professionals are, and adding studying for an exam, taking and exam and submitting an application for a certification was not on the top of the priority list. The academic equivalency program helped me make the decision to go for it because I was able to complete the course and apply for my certification at the same time, which made it an easier decision for me to apply.

Q6. How did taking courses under the academic equivalency program help you deepen your understanding of SE?

» As an instructor, taking the course under the academic equivalency program helped me see the SE learning experience from a different lens. I was able to see how the learning objectives for the course aligned to the INCOSE SE Handbook. The content in the Handbook was put into a context that was applicable for the course and the project was easily relatable and provided an opportunity to both use the knowledge obtained and allowed for a deeper understanding of the concepts presented as well.

Q7. What is your advice for students and research professionals pursuing SEP certification?

» If you have already put in the time and effort and have the experience and SE based knowledge take the extra steps to get certified. INCOSE is a National organization and the certifications recognizes practitioners that demonstrate SE knowledge and experience. Do it! Join the network of professionals and let's see what we can do together going forward leading the way.

Know more about Academic Equivalency from here
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