The McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science will begin merging two departments to increase faculty research and departmental interaction, school officials said this week. Students studying in the departments said they were unsure about the effects of the merging.

McCormick will combine the department of electrical and computer engineering and the computer science department. This will create the new electrical engineering and computer science department.

The merge will have “zero effects on students,” said McCormick associate dean Stephen Carr.

But he added that McCormick courses in the departments will eventually reflect the change and the computer science program – which is currently not accredited – will become accredited. This could attract more students, he said.

McCormick senior Naile Kovuk said the department’s accreditation will not effect her.

“(Accreditation) was not an important criteria for me,” she said. “I didn’t look at accreditation. I went here because I knew what I wanted to study.”

The merge will increase interaction among the departments to develop new courses, said Prof. Bruce Wessels, who will head the new department. Wessels added that the departments will gradually merge this year and will be fully transitioned by the end of the academic year.

“We want to enhance our reputation and our education,” he said. He added that faculty research topics will include artificial intelligence and advanced internet.

McCormick junior Valerie Concepcion, who serves as a research assistant for a computer engineering professor, said the inter-departmental research of professors could encourage students to get more involved with research outside their areas of expertise.

Students will then be able to recognize the similarities between the departments, she said.

“A lot of people associate computer science with just programming, but computer engineering is also involved (in programming),” Concepcion said.

As part of the merge, McCormick professors will concentrate their research in the Technological Institute and the Ford Motor Company Engineering Design Center.

This reorganization “gives rise to new ways of clustered expertise,” Carr said. “As faculty begin to live their (academic) lives in close proximity with other departments, new research can begin.”

Reach Margaret Matray at [email protected].