Naval Postgraduate School Program Seeks to Grow Warfighters’ Wireless Network Expertise

The Naval Postgraduate School is undertaking a graduate-level education and research program in partnership with the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering’s FutureG Office to help advance the Department of Defense’s next-generation wireless network capabilities. 

Tom Rondeau, FutureG’s principal director and a speaker at a past Potomac Officers Club event, approved a $1.8 million, eight-year support to the NPS project, which also seeks to develop the workforce deploying wireless technologies particularly important in expeditionary environments. Rondeau said FutureG invested in the partnership, as it knows how NPS recognizes the importance of 5G and the next-generation 6G on future warfighting challenges, DVIDS reported.

The expertise gained from the NPS program, called Active-Duty Open-Source Development, will also provide an understanding of ways to purchase, manage and innovate on advanced wireless networks, Rondeau added.

The ADOSD project will proceed in three phases, with the first focused on a master’s and doctoral-level study leveraging an open standards-based private 5G network testing structure. The results will establish the second phase of curriculum development for a course leading to an academic certificate. The final phase will sustain the curriculum’s development to continuously advance the operational and technical relevance of the master and doctoral research program