About Us

Our History

Less than a decade after the University of South Florida (southern-most location of a public university in Florida at that time and hence the name) opened its doors in 1956, the college of engineering offered its first classes in 1964. The Industrial and Management Systems Engineering department was founded in the same year under the leadership of Dr. Robert J. Wimmert. Starting with the BSIE program, the department soon added graduate programs at the master's and doctoral levels. In 1984 the degree program for the Master of Science in Engineering Management (MSEM) was added, which was the first fully distance learning (pre-Internet, through satellite links) master's program in engineering management in the southeastern U.S. The novelty and quality of this graduate program soon pushed its enrollment up to an unprecedented level in its early years. Currently, the IMSE department educates 150 bachelors, over 200 masters, and 25 full time PhD students. The department currently has 15 full time faculty and aspires to raise that number to 20 in coming years.