Cal Poly Pomona Business Students Putting Computers to Work

Think Cal Poly Pomona, and the Arabian horses that campus benefactor Will Keith Kellogg brought to the university in the 1920s may come to mind. Or you may think of the Center for Regenerative Studies, a high-visibility biosphere experiment launched by students and faculty members 2 1/2 years ago.

But in addition to the agricultural and environmental programs that are the school’s claim to fame, an innovative department in the College of Business Administration is finding new ways to train the computer specialists who design business networks, manage corporate databases and analyze a company’s telecommunications needs.

The computer information systems department has found a middle ground between the engineers trained by computer science departments and the technicians trained in short-term programs, and school officials believe that no other university in the country offers such a program.

The Pomona students understand both computer systems and the business environment in which they operate, which makes them uniquely attractive to companies ranging from Northrop Grumman Corp. to Coopers & Lybrand.

“They are what we need in the marketplace--people who understand the business first and know how to use computers to solve business problems,” said Al Alborn, a managing consultant with Texas Instruments Software Government Solutions in Falls Church, Va.

Winning that kind of praise from industry is the result of a constant refining of the curriculum, which gets a major overhaul every five years. The department presents the revised curriculum to professionals for constructive criticism.

On a recent Tuesday afternoon, John Crawford, the department’s director of academic programs, described for 30 representatives of Southland companies the classes that all students in the department take, including Accounting and Principles of Management as well as Object Oriented Programming and System Analysis and Design.

Students specialize in one of four tracks to get in-depth knowledge of a particular area.

The department also encourages students to work on real-world problems by stressing internships and senior projects that often double as pro bono corporate consulting assignments.

When Crawford asked for feedback, he got this response from Michael Cole, director of corporate information systems at Rockwell Information Technologies in Seal Beach: “In my view, the curriculum is right on.”

That kind of response is part of the reason why the business college enrolls more students than any other part of the university. The number of students majoring in computer information systems tops 700.

Shi-Min Lu, who attended the presentation, said the Pomona courses are more advanced than the technology used at Frame-N-Lens in Santa Fe Springs, where she runs four kinds of computer systems as manager for client support.

“This curriculum is very practical and hands-on,” she said. “I wish we had this when I was a student.”

Freelancer Karen Kaplan covers technology and careers for The Times. She can be reached via e-mail at karen.kaplan@latimes.com