The Georgia Institute of Technology is one of the nation's premier research universities. Ranked seventh among U.S. News & World Report's top public universities, Georgia Tech's more than 19,000 students are enrolled in its Colleges of Architecture, Computing, Engineering, Liberal Arts, Management and Sciences.

Georgia Tech's campus occupies 400 acres in the heart of the city of Atlanta, where undergraduate and graduate students receive a focused, technologically based education.

Georgia Tech is among the nation's top producers of women and African-American engineers. The Institute offers research opportunities to both undergraduate and graduate students and is home to more than 100 interdisciplinary units plus the Georgia Tech Research Institute. To learn more, visit (www.gatech.edu).

The School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) is the largest of nine schools and departments in the College of Engineering and the largest individual school at the Georgia Institute of Technology. All ECE undergraduate and graduate programs are in the top 10 of the most recent college rankings by U.S. News & World Report. More than 2,300 students are enrolled in the School’s graduate and undergraduate programs, and in the last academic year, 698 degrees were awarded.

More than 110 ECE faculty members are involved in 10 areas of research and education – bioengineering, computer engineering, digital signal processing, electrical energy, electromagnetics, electronic design and applications, microsystems and packaging, optics and photonics, systems and controls, and telecommunications. To learn more about ECE, visit (www.ece.gatech.edu).

History & Traditions. Founded on October 13, 1885, the Georgia School of Technology opened its doors in October 1888 to eighty-four students. The School's creation signaled the beginning of the transformation of the agrarian South to an industrial economy. During its first fifty years, Tech grew from a narrowly focused trade school to a regionally recognized technological university.

In 1948, the School's name was changed to the Georgia Institute of Technology to reflect a growing focus on advanced technological and scientific research. Women students were admitted in 1952, and in 1961 Georgia Tech became the first university in the Deep South to admit African American students without a court order.

In recent years, Georgia Tech has been a national leader in managing the global transition from an industrial economy to an information economy. Throughout its long history, Georgia Tech has always focused its efforts on preparing students to use their innovative skills and strong work ethic to solve real-world problems and improve the lives of people around the globe.

From the world-famous "Ramblin' Wreck" fight song to the Ramblin' Wreck Parade held every Homecoming to the fun and festivities of RATS Week, the Tech campus is steeped in time-honored traditions that students embrace from generation to generation.

University System of Georgia. Georgia Tech is one of thirty-five public institutions of higher education that comprise the University System of Georgia. Tech is one of the university system's four research universities. The system also includes two regional universities, thirteen state universities, three four-year colleges, and thirteen two-year colleges. Their collective degree-program enrollments exceed 200,000 students, making the University System one of the nation's largest systems of public higher education.

The University System of Georgia is governed by a sixteen-member Board of Regents, appointed by the governor. The board hires a chancellor to serve as chief executive officer for the system.

By Vasil Sidorov on November 11, 2009 from Georgia Tech

sidorovvasil@gmail.com