The Fifth Year History Many years ago, a "fifth year" was proposed that would accommodate all of the new developments that were taking place. These topics were then, as now, competing for a place in the undergraduate curricula. Some major engineering schools developed five year programs to accommodate knowledge expansion, but they awarded only the bachelor's degree. Since a master's degree could be earned at other schools in the same five years, the five year bachelor's was economically

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... etitive. It is proposed that engineering reconsider adopting a five year format, leading to a master's degree, not a bachelor's degree. The ultimate goal is to provide additional technical expertise, but also to add the breadth that could make engineering a more attractive educational experience, leading to expanded career opportunities. with a greater emphasis on leadership of technical activities to support lifetime career development. Engineering Enrollments The number of freshmen entering engineering schools, in the United States, has not substantially increased in over twenty years. This during the greatest explosion of technology the world has ever seen. In 1982, 114,517 freshmen engineers were enrolled. Now we hover around 90,000. With the U. S. Population at 281 million, we should be enrolling 142,000, had we sustained the same population-enrollment ratio of 1982. To cloud our local picture even more, half of the engineering freshmen at Santa Clara are choosing computer engineering, leaving the traditional engineering fields in peril of long term survival. To attract 50,000 additional freshmen to engineering has become a very real goal. But to do this, something has to change. New Engineer Perceptions We asked fifty of our young engineering graduates why they thought freshmen engineering enrollments were flat. Their evaluation: