Barely had the ink dried on the Tennessee Higher Education Commission’s approval of the MTSU mechatronics engineering program when things began to stir in the university’s Engineering Technology department.

Less than 24 hours after the late July approval, telephones began ringing and emails began coming in to the offices and computers of department chair Walter Boles and faculty member Ahad Nasab.

Nasab, who answered the call to be the mechatronics program’s coordinator, received 12 emails and phone calls by the next day. Several days later, he was meeting with students extremely interested in jumping into a program that makes MTSU a full-fledged engineering school.

“It’s, quite honestly, a game-changer,” said Jimmy Davis, an MTSU alumnus and owner of industry partner The Davis Groupe, an integrated supplier of products and services to the world whose clients include Toyota, General Motors and Nissan. Davis also is an Engineering Technology Advisory Board member and past president. “Now MTSU is a true engineering school. They have a true engineering degree. … The engineering technology department is taking it to the next level.”

For more information about the program, email Nasab at ahad.nasab@mtsu.edu or call 615-898-2052. You can read more about the story at http://mtsunews.com/mechatronics-arrival-signals-growth-jobs.