Each time when I meet new friends, they usually introduce themselves by telling me which academic department they come from or which specific major they are engaged. When it is my turn to say some information about myself, I have to say, well, we are from the college of information sciences and technology. With special emphasis, it is a college, not a department, and it is funny to say that we IST have no departments at all. At this moment, people may get a little bit confused about what the hell I am studying. With embarrassment, I have to use more word than simply a name of program to explain my academic background, for example, by numerating the research projects I have ever participated and the courses I have ever taken.
The non-department structure is a unique characteristic of IST. In my opinion, such a structure has apparent advantages as we always advocate, as well as potential disadvantages as we may overlook. We IST have a very, very broad spectrum of research areas, and having no departments to a large extent facilitates the collaboration among faculty/students with different research interests and backgrounds. Another apparent benefit is that it helps student build wide perspectives in addressing issues associated with information technology, rather than analyzing them from a single isolated angel of Information, People or Technology. On the flip side, having no department also brings about some undesirable results. Because of no department, each research slice in the huge IST pizza is not of the same size. That is to say, the development of each area is lack of balance. We have two large groups of computational informatics and HCI, leading by Professor Lee and Professor Carroll respectively. However, groups of computational intelligence and information security are not that big. The overemphasis on the broadth of IST PhD trainning can also be reflected from the curriculum. It seems to me we have fairly few courses beyond those four IST core courses. For second year students, we have no choice but to take a variety of theory or methodology courses outside of IST. I strongly suggest IST open more optional courses focusing on each specific research areas to sharpen our understanding.
A question raised here is what is the best structure for the good of IST's future development. I think we can address this question from the perspective of organization science. There are basically two types of structures for business firms: hierarchical and horizontal. Hierarchical structures allow firms more controls on subsections and thus make sure the firms on the good track. The horizontal one has been accepted as an appropriate model for the knowledge age because it facilitates innovation and creation. Is IST better off to find a good balance between hierarchical and horizontal models in terms of its structure? I think it is an interesting question worth to be explored.
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