IEEE Newsletter

In Memory of Andy Sage

Few people have had such extraordinary impact as Andy Sage has had, as a pioneer and

leader in systems engineering, as founding Dean of the School of Engineering at Mason, as a

prolific author and as an educator.

As founding Dean, Andy had the vision to focus on information technology when it was

virtually in its infancy. He hired an impressive array of scholars to lead the integration of IT

and engineering. And he had the foresight to create the first interdisciplinary PhD in IT in the

country. To paraphrase the country song, Andy was IT when IT wasn't cool.

Equally amazing, Andy had the vision to establish undergraduate and graduate program in

systems engineering when few others believed systems engineering was a discipline. At the

time the program at Mason was one of only a handful of programs in existence, at the

forefront of systems engineering education. It took many years till others recognized the

importance of the field. Andy was SE when SE wasn't cool.

Andy wrote, co-wrote, and edited a staggering number of books - well over twenty. His

books spanned a wide range of topics, including communications and control, stochastic

processes, decision support systems, economic systems, and, of course, systems

engineering.

Andy's pioneering work in systems engineering also led him to establish the earliest journals

focusing on systems engineering. He was founding editor of the INCOSE journal Systems

Engineering, and served for 27 years as editor of the IEEE Systems, Man, and Cybernetics

Transactions.

Along this journey Andy garnered numerous honors: election into the National Academy of

Engineering, the Samuel Ramo Award, the INCOSE Pioneer award, as well as several

Society Fellowships. The annual Andrew P Sage Best Transactions Paper award is the

highest honor bestowed by IEEE SMCT.

Each of these achievements alone is more than most academics would hope to achieve in

their lifetime. But Andy successfully crammed several lifetimes of achievements in the course

of his professional journey. And he did that with collegiality, generosity, and grace.

His broad contributions continue to live within us, and will guide generations of systems

engineers in years to come.

Ariela Sofer

Professor and Chair

Department of Systems Engineering and Operations Research

George Mason University