IEEE Robotics & Automation Magazine - September 2017 - 158

sequence or unified textbook, and the most commonly used
textbooks are identified. Though there appears to be a gap in
the market's offerings, causing many instructors (46%) to
write their own in-house texts, very few instructors (10.8%)
are taking advantage of free online courseware. In terms of
programming environments, MATLAB (62%) and C (52%)
remain the dominant choices, with a minority using free
open-source packages such as the Robot Operating System
(ROS) (28%) or OpenCV (17%). There is incredible diversity
in terms of the hardware used to support the experimental
component of these courses. In particular, with regard to
articulated manipulators, faculty members note that there is a
shortage of low-cost, small-form-factor equipment.
Based on the data presented here, I propose four goals
for the robotics community: 1) introducing curricular standards for robotics degree programs, 2) creating new textbooks with broader topic coverage, 3) developing low-cost
articulated manipulators, and 4) establishing an IEEE
Robotics and Automation Society (RAS) Technical Committee (TC) on education.
Educational Evolution
The first few decades of robotics education saw a proliferation
of course offerings, originally at the graduate level and later
for undergraduates. These courses are typically electives that
are housed in traditional academic departments such as computer science, mechanical engineering, or electrical engineering. In the 1980s, robots trickled down into the curriculum
and are still being used today as a vehicle to teach introductory design and computer programming at the college level and
recruit K-12 students to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
The latest phase of this educational evolution involves the
creation of robotics degree programs at both the graduate and
undergraduate levels. During the last decade, seven B.S. degree
and 11 Ph.D. degree programs have been introduced;
undoubtedly, more are in the works. In fact, the 2013 U.S.
Robotics Roadmap [1] called for the creation of no fewer than
ten accredited B.S. degree programs and 10 Ph.D. degree programs in the United States alone by the year 2028. This push to
create robotics degree programs suggests that it may be beneficial to identify common requirements, curricula, resources,
and challenges for robotics education. Yet there is no RAS TC
on education, no Accreditation Board for Engineering and
Technology (ABET) program criteria, and no American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE) division of robotics to
organize such efforts. Although much has been written about
individual course structures and a few degree programs (e.g.,
[2]-[4]), to my knowledge, this article is the first to present
data based on a formal and comprehensive faculty survey on
the current state of robotics education (also a first).
Survey Content, Methodology, and Participants
The data in this article are culled from the responses to a survey, "The State of Robotics Education," deployed using Google
Forms, which comprises five sections: institutional back158

IEEE ROBOTICS & AUTOMATION MAGAZINE

SEPTEMBER 2017

ground, robotics degree programs, introductory robotics
courses, educational resources, and future challenges. The full
set of questions and response data are available online in both
summary [5] and raw [6] form. The survey was distributed
during the fall of 2015 to the robotics community primarily via
the Robotics Worldwide list server that had 9,986 subscribers
at the time. Additional responses were directly solicited from
institutions known to offer a robotics degree program.
There were 75 responses received, representing 67 distinct institutions. Of these, 52 (77%) were from the United
States, three from Canada, one from Mexico, five from
South America, one from Australia, and five from Europe.
The institutional distribution by highest technical degree
awarded was Ph.D. (77%), M.S. (6%), B.S. (17%), and A.S.
(0%). Unfortunately, there were no responses from Asian
universities or from two-year colleges despite follow-up
requests for participation. Clearly, some sample bias exists,
stemming from the mailing list used (English-language
only) and the fact that the participants were self-selecting. I
believe that the data from the survey reasonably depict the
way in which robotics is taught at four-year colleges and
universities in the United States, but I caution against
extrapolating beyond that.
Degree Programs in Robotics
The first set of questions focuses on undergraduate and
graduate degree programs in robotics. Only official programs for which the word robotics is listed on the diploma
or transcript are considered. For example, a graduate of a
Ph.D. degree program in mechanical engineering whose
thesis topic is in the area of robotics, or a graduate of a general engineering B.S. degree program who took a set of electives in robotics, would not be counted among the graduates
listed here. The existence of degree programs reported
through the survey was verified via the institution's website
with a follow-up request to the program director to confirm
the number of degrees awarded.
Survey Results
I have confirmed the existence of one associate's degree program, ten undergraduate minor programs, seven bachelor's
programs, 15 master's programs, and 11 doctoral programs in
robotics, conferring a total of 768 degrees annually. A full listing with a breakdown by degree awarded and number of
annual graduates appears in "Robotics Degree Programs and
Their Estimated Numbers of Annual Graduates." The data
are maintained at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_
robotics, where they can be updated and edited by the program representatives.
The structure of the B.S. programs can be divided into
three categories: general engineering-style programs with
upper-level concentration options in robotics (e.g., Arizona
State University); programs designed around a core set of
required robotics courses, often called a unified robotics
sequence (e.g., Worchester Polytechnic University); and programs primarily composed of electives that must be chosen

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Educational_

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