Student Working Groups: An effective form of improving microelectronics education quality

The educational challenges to keep pace with today's microelectronics industry and Moore's Law result in universities being unable to provide graduates with the required qualifications to make them ready for employment immediately upon graduation. The most effective way of addressing this issue is the development and function of new educational models based on close collaboration between industry and academic institutions. One successful example is Synopsys' cooperation with leading technical universities in Armenia and the surrounding region. In the last decade, the successful experience of this educational model has created a constructive environment for the creation of principally new and more effective forms of delivering microelectronics education. One such means is through the creation of Student Working Groups (SWGs) that are in essence a prototype design team within an educational environment. SWGs allow future engineers, serving as interns, to gain experience similar in all aspects to real life work (professional skills, teamwork, etc). This paper will highlight the experience of implementing SWGs in the Synopsys Armenia Education Department (SAED).