Georgia Tech students spending their second year in Stuttgart will also do an internship with either Daimler or Bosch, gaining both industrial technical expertise and experience in international business. The first groups of students to participate in the program will enter their respective institutions in the Fall, 2014 term.

The University of Stuttgart was founded in 1829 as a technical university and currently has 24,600 students, 7,500 of whom are studying mechanical engineering, one of the first four programs established there. Mechanical engineering was the first and only program at Georgia Tech for the first eight years of its existence. With roughly 3,000 students currently studying at undergraduate and graduate levels, it is the largest program on the Tech campus.

The two programs are complementary in their emphases, with each offering additional opportunities to students not available at their home campuses. The faculties of both programs will jointly supervise student research, leading to a strengthening of existing collaborations between the institutions.

The new joint M.S. degree program has been under development for the past two years. This week’s signing in Atlanta by Provost Rafael Bras of Georgia Tech and Rector Wolfram Ressel of Stuttgart was preceded by a visit last week to the Stuttgart campus from a Georgia Tech delegation led by Bras and including ME Chair William Wepfer and Associate Chair Paul Neitzel.

“This joint program provides students from both countries with marvelous opportunities to expand both their technical and cultural horizons, gaining the broader global perspective required in today’s ‘flat’ world," said Neitzel, associate chair for graduate studies in the Woodruff School.

Although the instruction at both universities will be in English, students beginning at Georgia Tech will be required to have some facility with German, which will not only be important in their university and internship environments, but will enhance their overall experience in Germany.