Carnegie Mellon Partnership

In January 2003, SMU and Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) forged a four-year strategic partnership intended to leverage the experience and expertise of CMU faculty to assist SMU in establishing an innovative School of Information Systems (SIS) that would offer undergraduates a business-oriented IT education. In the four years that followed, the partnership exceeded its initial objectives, extending beyond efforts related to the new SIS into activities that benefited both partners. In recognition of this success, and of the potential for even deeper collaboration, SMU and Carnegie Mellon agreed in May 2007 to extend their partnership for an additional four years.

In its first phase, the SMU-CMU partnership focused on establishing and developing SIS's undergraduate programme, including faculty recruitment, development and mentoring; curriculum and course design; and the establishment of the flagship SMU - CMU Fast-Track programme, which enables SIS students to graduate within four-and-a-half years with both a bachelor's degree from SMU and a master's degree from Carnegie Mellon.

In its second phase, the focus of the SMU-CMU relationship has shifted to supporting the establishment and growth of SIS's post-graduate education offering, including research-focused Master's and PhD programmes and a professionally-oriented Master's programme. The universities will also increase their focus on collaborative research efforts leading to joint faculty research outputs, funded projects and PhD student interaction.

Going forward, both institutions will continue to develop new funded research projects, which will provide additional resources for our faculty and students to collaborate, and will also reinforce our shared mission to produce high-quality, globally relevant research that impacts both theory and practice.

Check out the SMU-Carnegie Mellon Fast Track Programme

Learn about the Carnegie Mellon Study Abroad Opportunity

Carnegie Mellon Faculty Participants