ISU, AMIS renew memorandum of understanding

Idaho State University President Arthur C. Vailas and AMI Semiconductor President and Chief Executive Officer Christine King renewed a memorandum of understanding between AMIS and ISU to develop a closer working relationship through educational and workplace cooperation.

A signing ceremony was held in October that was attended by a variety of ISU and AMIS officials. AMIS and ISU are Bannock County’s largest private and public employers respectively. The understanding was first signed in 2002 by King and then-ISU President Richard Bowen, who both last renewed it in March 2004. AMIS also donated $10,000 to the ISU College of Engineering Department during the ceremony.

Both King and Vailas agreed that “intellectual property” is of supreme importance. At the signing ceremony Vailas said ISU and AMIS hope to collaborate on research projects.

“We’d like to embark on some high-impact research with national and global implications, putting Pocatello on the map,” Vailas said.

Under the terms of the memorandum, the two parties will:

• Designate educational liaison officers to communicate educational, internship, research, and work needs effectively and efficiently.

• AMIS will encourage its employees to pursue ISU programs to meet their educational needs and AMIS will ask ISU to respond to short- and long-term program requests. ISU recognizes that the institution cannot fulfill all the needs of AMIS, but will facilitate the delivery of programming within the expertise of ISU.

• Create internship, part-time employment and other cooperative programs.

• Allow AMIS employees to teach in an adjunct capacity at ISU.

• Allow ISU faculty members short-term leaves or sabbaticals to AMIS.

• AMIS will be represented on appropriate ISU advisory boards.

• When feasible, AMIS and ISU will perform collaborative research.

• AMIS may donate to ISU used manufacturing equipment, when available.

• AMIS employees may be guest lecturers at ISU to provide students an opportunity to study real-world applications to their degrees.

Following the agreement’s signing, Jon Stoner, AMIS chief technology officer, presented Dr. Richard Jacobsen, ISU’s College of Engineering dean, with a $10,000 check for new work stations to be installed in the ISU Electrical Engineering Department’s VLSI laboratory.

“Their donation is very helpful to our college and department, and allows us to upgrade the workstations we have, allowing us to have the same types of computers here at ISU as they have at AMIS,” said Dr. Lawrence Stout, ISU associate professor of electrical engineering. “AMIS is also giving us technical assistance to help run the workstations. They have the expertise to help us, and that allows our students to do some things we couldn’t have afforded to do without the donation.”