Event
INCOSE Seminar: John Thomas, UC Boulder: "Resilience Engineering"
Thursday, August 11, 2022
3:00 p.m.
Online presentation
Rebecca Copeland
301 405 6602
rebeccac@umd.edu
https://incose-org.zoom.us/j/81931533718?pwd=eityaW1tNUVYODRsWkJXOWUxTEN3QT09
INCOSE Critical Infrastructure Protection and Recovery Working Group Virtual Meeting
Resilience Engineering: What is it and why is it important in education?
John Thomas
Scholar in Residence, Engineering Management Program
School of Engineerng and Applied Sciences
University of Colorado, Boulder
Abstract
Critical Infrastructures (CI) essential to public health, safety, and well-being are inherently vulnerable to unanticipated disruptions that can impact businesses, technical operations, supply chains, and daily life across local, regional, and global scales. The cascading effects of system breakdowns reflect the interdependencies among CI systems and adds to the complexity of effective resilient response, which often requires interaction across multiple operating domains in public, private, and commercial sectors. However, resilience engineering courses and programs are ‘few and far between’ in academia. As a result, many engineering graduates are woefully unprepared for the evolving threat, design, and operational challenges they may face. This presentation will introduce resilience engineering as an emergent knowledgebase in academia, examine why it is important, and explore how it may contribute to the resilience of critical infrastructure essential to public health, safety, and well-being.
Biography
Dr. John E. Thomas is a Scholar in Residence with the Engineering Management Program in the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, University of Colorado, Boulder. John is passionate about the promise of sustainable and resilient life experience for future generations. His research interests explore the boundaries of engineering and social science to understand the dynamic relationships between human resilience, psychological development, and the resilience of complex social, ecological, and technological systems like critical infrastructure supporting community well-being. Dr. Thomas holds BS & MS degrees in Electrical Engineering, an MBA, and a Ph.D. in Civil, Environmental, and Sustainable Engineering.
