The scope and complexity of engineered systems are ever-increasing as burgeoning global markets, unprecedented technological capabilities, rising consumer expectations, and ever-changing social requirements present difficult design challenges that often extend beyond the traditional engineering paradigm. These challenges require engineers and technical managers to treat the technological systems as a part of a larger whole. Existing system modeling frameworks are limited in scope for representing the information about engineering systems. This paper presents a conceptual framework and an improved modeling framework for engineering systems. Its value is that it allows engineers and managers an improved means to visually arrange information and structure discourse in a way that facilitates better systems engineering. It augments the existing literature by providing a clear and concise framework for an engineering system, and provides a methodology for engineers to tag and organize systems information in ways that allow for better collection, storage, processing, and analysis of systems engineering data.

The goal of this research is to develop an analytical framework for screening for real options "in" an engineering system. Real options is defined in the finance literature as the right, but not the obligation, to take an action (e.g. deferring, expanding, contracting, or abandoning) at a predetermined cost and for a predetermined time. These are called "real options" because they pertain to physical or tangible assets, such as equipment, rather than financial instruments. Real options improve a system's capability of undergoing classes of changes with relative ease. This property is often called "flexibility." Recently, the DoD has emphasized the need to develop flexible system in order to improve operational, technical, and programmatic effectiveness. The aim of this research is to apply real options thinking to weapon acquisitions in order to promote the ability of weapon system programs to deftly avoid downside consequences or exploit upside opportunities.The practice of real options in systems engineering is a nascent field of inquiry. One of the most significant challenges in applying real options to engineering systems is the problem of identifying the most efficacious points within the system to create options. In order to identify the points of interest, systems engineers require knowledge about the physical and non physical aspects of the system, insight into sources of change, and the ability to examine the dynamic behavior of the system. We propose a two-phase process to perform this analysis. The first

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In response to an articulated customer need for more engineering graduates who can "think in systems engineering terms," the United States Air Force Academy recently began the process of developing a new undergraduate academic major in systems engineering. An interdisciplinary team of engineering educators, computer science and behavioral science professors, employed a robust systems engineering process to design the major so that the needs of all constituencies would be met during a time of constrained resources. In true systems engineering fashion, the team created a robust program architecture based on customer needs and requirements, a review of existing programs, and a forward-looking concept of operations. The architecture not only included the curricular design, but also addressed other aspects of the system, to include organizational design, marketing, and research. The systems engineering methodology allowed the team to establish the systems engineering major in an efficient, thorough, and organized manner. In less than a year the systems engineering major was in place with over 30 students enrolled. This paper will present the entire developmental process, describe the major in detail, and discuss how a systems engineering framework can be used to easily meet all ABET General Criteria.

Cadets at the U.S. Air Force Academy face one of the most challenging academic experiences available. In addition to taking a heavy load of courses, they are required to participate in athletic and military training activities. Additionally, many choose to pursue significant involvement in military leadership, airmanship programs, or intercollegiate athletics. Time pressure for these cadets is intense, leading in many cases to lower academic performance than cadets are capable of demonstrating. Many struggle to learn effective time management in this environment. Leaders at the Academy have been evaluating how to potentially reduce the time pressure to improve the end result for graduates. This paper presents the development of a dynamic system simulation, called CadetSIM, that can assist cadets with time management decisions and that can provide insight to institutional decision-makers.The environment at the U.S. Air Force Academy was analyzed at the system level in terms of time requirements. System design and analysis tools were used to structure a model of the cadet time environment. Tools included brainstorming, system architecting, and the construction of a System Dynamic Matrix. Causal relationships stemming from procrastination were incorporated. Due to transient time requirements and system feedback from procrastination, a dynamic system simulation was chosen as the preferred method to analyze system behavior. A commercial software package, STELLA®, was used to create the final product.The results of this work produced CadetSIM, a continuous-time dynamic system simulation of cadet time requirements over the course of a semester. CadetSIM's tailored input interface allows the user to create a particular cadet profile to simulate. Output from the simulation shows the user how time expenditure for academics, athletics, military training, sleep, maintenance functions, and discretionary activities will dynamically interact through the semester.A profile for a typical cadet majoring in engineering is analyzed and presented in this paper. Results show that this cadet has very little discretionary time and experiences periodic sleep deprivation. Most interestingly, we find that with increased procrastination discretionary time and possibly sleep will decrease to maintain a desired level of performance.CadetSIM will allow a cadet to evaluate the future impact of decisions about activities and study behavior. CadetSIM can help institutional decision makers better understand the dynamic Page 9.280.1