Telecommunication engineering education (TEE): making the case for a new multidisciplinary undergraduate field of study

Six years of sustained efforts to recognize telecommunication engineering (TE) as a distinct education discipline came to a successful conclusion on November 1, 2014, with ABET's approval of its 2015-2016 Criteria for Electrical, Computer, Communications, Telecommunication(s) and Similarly Named Engineering Programs. This paper narrates the history of the Telecommunication Engineering Education (TEE) initiative and movement (2008–2014) which resulted in recognition of this field as a distinct engineering education discipline in the US and 28 other countries. We describe how the case for this recognition was made successfully, based on advances in network science and engineering. We discuss some aspects of the new ABET criteria, and how they relate to ongoing and anticipated changes in the arena of engineering education.