Why SARC.Academy?
The aim of SARC’s national graduate school SARC.Academy is to offer high-quality and relevant courses within aeronautical subjects for Ph.D. candidates within the NFFP projects and related fields to aeronautics within Sweden. This includes the strategic international collaboration countries Brazil, UK and Germany. An important measure of success of SARC.Academy is the formation of a network among the Ph.D. candidates that will foster their research and enable shared publications, reuse of results and the sharing of infrastructures and information. An expected outcome is a higher percentage of graduated students that stay within aeronautics within Sweden.
The national graduate school will prioritise activities that make international collaboration possible such as:
- International competitions (e.g. SAE BRASIL AeroDesign project)
- Double degree programmes
Setup
SARC.Academy will offer courses open for every NFFP student. Ph.D. candidates involved in aeronautics research outside NFFP can also apply. People working in industry can also participate and take courses and will be offered positions depending on availability. Courses are in general free for academic Ph.D. students and researchers, although fees may apply for industrial participations. PhD students that have fulfilled the minimum of SARC.Academy Ph.D. courses will be issued a SARC.Academy diploma upon completion of their Ph.D.
The SARC.Academy builds on experiences from former SSF Endrea (1997–2002, research on engineering design) and the ProViking (2002–2012, research on product realisation Ph.D. graduate schools. Both graduate schools were introduced together within research programmes with some similarities to the NFFP.
Admission
Admission to the SARC.Academy is on an individual basis, through decision of the SARC board. Applications are normally managed by the director of studies before they are presented to the SARC board.
The SARC.Academy is open to all PhD students involved in NFFP projects, and they are strongly encouraged to apply. PhD students involved in other projects related to aeronautics are also encouraged to apply.
PhD students enrolled in the SARC.Academy will have full access to all courses offered through the SARC.Academy.
Kick-off
The SARC.Academy commenced operation in spring 2019 with the first SARC Short Summer School (S4) in March 2019. To highlight the importance of building international relations among the PhD candidates, the first “kick-off” course was held in Florianopolis, Brazil in collaboration with the Santa Catharina Convergence Centre in Aeronautics, SC2C.Aero, at the Federal University of Santa Caterina (UFSC). The invited speaker of this first SARC course is Dr Dan P. Raymer, a well-known international expert and lecturer. The course topic was “Aircraft Design: A Conceptual Approach”.
Course programme
The SARC.Academy graduate school will each year offer a range of courses. These include the following:
- Annual SARC.Academy Conference
- Annual S4 – SARC Short Summer School (one-week activity)
- Regularly given fundamental aeronautics courses such as:
- Propulsion systems
- Aircraft systems engineering
- Computational fluid dynamics
- Lightweight structures for aerospace applications
These regularly given basic courses will be complemented by a number of specialisation courses in a wide range of aeronautics-related fields that are offered to the SARC community. SARC will also act as an agent to publish/share information about relevant courses given within Sweden and internationally.
Strategic activities
SARC is not performing education on master or bachelor level directly. Still, SARC has a strong interest in promoting the interest in aviation studies, attracting good students and developing a strong educational basis in Sweden. This means that collaborative projects bilaterally with key countries/universities, including surveys of aeronautical education internationally, may be performed. Also, establishing strategies and informal networks, work groups etc. to promote educational activities, including gender, could be integrated into SARC activities.
SARC activities related to undergraduate education include collaboration between master programs by e.g. course sharing. When it comes to international collaboration (especially with Brazil), PhD and master students fall under the same category as “graduate students”. Therefore, some integration of courses between Master and PhD level may occur. In addition, SARC will also promote international collaboration also for undergraduate students through its international network. This includes facilitating student exchange, double degree programmes, etc.