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Students Receive High-Tech Business Experience LSU's Information Technology Apprenticeship Program, or ITAP, is an innovative economic development project sponsored by LSU CAPITAL, a center for computation and technology. The program is creating new graduate research opportunities for students, while assisting growing tech companies with IT functions like programming and web design. "The apprenticeship program helps fledgling companies that are just beginning," said Thomas G. Ray, chairman of the Department of Industrial & Manufacturing Systems Engineering at LSU.
The Louisiana Technology Park, located in Baton Rouge on Florida Boulevard and the Louisiana Business & Technology Center, located on the LSU campus, both use highly qualified ITAP graduate students in assistantship positions. Both of these business incubators assist small companies during the development stages. Information technology companies housed in the incubators, like voterVOICE.net and Emergent Technologies, use ITAP students to program software for their businesses or create the company's online presence. In fact, Emergent Technologies currently has three ITAP students apprenticing for the company. ITAP allows the University's graduate students to gain experience while furthering their education. The program has proved so successful that the first graduate student to participate in ITAP, Rao Bob Lakkula, is now employed by the company that he worked with as a student. "I was working towards my Ph.D. in information technology engineering when I heard about this opportunity. I was excited about getting real job experience with an actual technology company," said Lakkula. "Now I work as the IT development specialist for Emergent Technologies. It's a great job." More than 10 students per semester and approximately 10 companies have participated in the program since it began in January 2002. Each company involved has an opportunity to use the graduate students for their own business development projects. "Almost all of the graduate students are studying engineering, but they have information technology experience and lots of programming knowledge," said Ray.
ITAP receives funding from both LSU CAPITAL and the companies participating in the apprenticeship program. The LSU Center for Applied Information Technology and Learning, or LSU CAPITAL, was created in 2001 to advance education, research, and economic development in Louisiana through the use of information technology. As the University's information technology center, LSU CAPITAL implements projects funded through the Louisiana Legislature's Information Technology Initiative, which grants $9 million annually to LSU. Other funding for ITAP comes from the companies that are utilizing the program. According to Ray, ITAP is like venture capital. "We have a gentleman's agreement with the companies. They will replace the funds as they can," said Ray. The Information Technology Apprenticeship Program is just one of the economic development projects sponsored by LSU CAPITAL. The education and research projects that the center sponsors are all geared towards making Baton Rouge a better place to work, live, and do business through the use of information technology.Contact Jennifer Hughes | LSU
University Relations Related Links LSU CAPITAL |
