Our fall on-campus program to get to know Viterbi!
As part of Discover USC, Viterbi will host a full day expo full of seminars, lab tours, student orgs, and more. Don't miss your chance to see what it's like to be a Viterbi Engineer.
Saturday, November 16th
9:00 AM – 4:00 PM
It’s All Part of Discover USC
The Discover USC Program is a full day, open house event on campus each year in the fall. It is the best way to get to know what being a student here is like before choosing to apply. There are campus-wide activities such as campus tours, student panels, financial aid presentations, and academic unit sessions.
Here at Viterbi, we give presentations about our programs and also open up the ViterbiEXPO. The EXPO includes lab tours, micro-seminars, a student organization fair, a photo booth, and awesome Viterbi Swag. The EXPO is designed to give you the best look at USC Viterbi and help answer any questions you have about student life, entrepreneurship, undergraduate research, going abroad, getting a job, and student advisement.
Two Ways to Schedule Your Day
*Note: There are two ways to experience the Viterbi Expo: you can attend the morning keynote, and then explore the Expo in the afternoon, or you can attend the afternoon keynote after the Expo. Keep in mind, the keynotes are the same presentation. Since they are very popular, and we only have 320 seats available, we ask that you give priority to our student visitors who wish to view the presentation.
Option 1
- 9:00 am: Check-in on Trousdale and explore campus
- 10:15 am: Keynote* in Seeley G. Mudd Building (SGM) 123
- 11:30 am: EXPO opens in Epstein Family Plaza
- 12:00 – 3:00 pm: Micro-seminars and lab tours
Option 2
- 9:00 am: Check-in on Trousdale and explore campus
- 11:30 am: EXPO opens in Epstein Family Plaza
- 12:00 – 3:00 pm: Micro-seminars and lab tours
- 3:00 pm: Keynote* in Seeley G. Mudd Building (SGM) 123
Want to know what you’ll see at the Viterbi EXPO?
Check out the timetable below to see the micro-seminars, tours and presentations offered. Use the red buttons to see descriptions of the mirco-seminars, labs, student orgs, and more.
Keep scrolling to see more!
KEYNOTE PRESENTATIONS
You won’t want to miss this presentation with everything you need to know about the USC Viterbi School of Engineering before applying.
Paul Ledesma, our Director of Undergraduate Admission, will give a comprehensive presentation that details everything from the application process to all of the opportunities USC Viterbi provides. Current engineering students will also be there to share some of their experiences in USC Viterbi .
Keynote Presentation

Paul Ledesma
Director of Undergraduate Admission
Keynote 1- 10:15 AM
Keynote 2- 3:00 PM
Seeley G. Mudd Building (SGM) 123
Each session covers exactly the same material, so feel free attend the presentation either before or after you experience the #ViterbiEXPO.
Get to know Viterbi
The USC Viterbi School of Engineering provides a collaborative, hands-on experience for students interested in innovation, communication and the use of engineering to solve societal problems. Your strengths in math and science may have you looking at the world and noticing challenges you want to solve: new and renewable forms of energy, space exploration, modern medicine and devices, extreme events such as tsunamis and earthquakes, more efficient ways to get business done, creating new software, making robotic systems that make our lives easier, or many others.
Please join us and a panel of students as we review our four-year engineering programs and how USC Viterbi students do more than just engineering: We call this Engineering +. We will discuss required high school preparation for our programs as well as the unique co-curricular programs available to our students — such as our Career Services Program, Center for Engineering Diversity, Women in Engineering, Undergraduate Research, and our focused entrepreneurial support through the Viterbi Student Institute for Innovation.
SEMINARS AND DEMOS
There’s so much more to share.
At #ViterbiEXPO we will host micro-seminars and activities that go into more details about other aspects of USC life. We plan to included presentations about internships, careers, and success after undergraduate, grad school opportunities, and engineering plus, the idea of doing more than just engineering.
Every year is different, but here is an idea of some microseminar topics previously offered at #ViterbiEXPO.
HUMAN SPACEFLIGHT:
CURRENT, PAST, AND NEAR FUTURE
Learn about Prof. Garrett Reisman’s journey from the NASA Space Shuttle and Space Station programs, to his work with SpaceX in commercial human spaceflight, to his current position teaching Human Spaceflight courses at USC Viterbi.
CYBORGS AMONG US:
ELECTRONIC PARTS FOR BODY AND BRAIN
Explore some of the many electronic interfaces between the human body and machines that can repair or replace functions damaged by diseases and injuries.
ENGINEERING+:
DIVERSE OFFERINGS FOR DIVERSE ENGINEERS
Hear from current students and staff in Academic Services and the Center for Engineering Diversity about ways to study engineering plus your other passions. Learn about double majors, minors, and other involvement opportunities.
DISTRIBUTED MACHINE LEARNING
(AND OTHER FUN PROBLEMS)
Come learn about recent results for predicting performance of machine learning applications, economic incentives for resource sharing, and future research goals to broaden the population of users capable of discovering machine learning models and applying them to novel applications.
IMAGING INFORMATICS IN PERSONALIZED HEALTHCARE
Join Professor Brent Liu as he addresses the Grand Challenge of ‘Advancing Health Informatics’ and explains how Imaging Informatics can be utilized as a powerful tool towards personalized medicine.
SYSTEMS THEORY IN WIRELESS, ROBOTIC NETWORKS, & BIOLOGICAL COMMUNICATION
Explore some potentially surprising applications of systems theory and design, including wireless communications, autonomous robotic networks, and biological communication.
BUILDING THE GAMEMAKERS OF TOMORROW
An overview of the various opportunities to learn video game programming including courses, specializations, minors or the major. Take a quick look at video game design classes leading up to the Advanced Game Program and the USCGames EXPO.
WHAT’S NEXT? PLANNING YOUR POST-GRAD FUTURE
What will you do after college? Join graduate admission and career counselors as they discuss your future and how we prepare students for success in graduate programs and the job search process.
LAB TOURS
Lab tours show some of the spaces where we get our hands dirty.
We will offer guided tours of some of our labs to show you what types of spaces we have for students to participate in research, hands on projects, lab classes, and more. Students and professors will be there to explain their research and share their experiences.
Seeing some of our hands-on spaces are highlights of the day! Check out some of the lab tours we’ve offered in the past at #ViterbiEXPO:
COMPOSITE MATERIALS LAB
Spacecraft, military jets, Formula 1 cars, and racing yachts that lift themselves out of the water! Come see how making (and breaking!) carbon fiber composites helps us understand the highest performance materials known to man and to push the envelope for what is possible.
DRYDEN WIND TUNNEL
The Dryden Wind Tunnel studies the aerodynamics of small flying things – natural or engineered – and uses the results of this research to design new aircrafts.
INTEGRATIVE BIOSYSTEMS ENGINEERING
Creating biologically-inspired in vitro platforms to capture the scale of cell signaling in tissue micro-environments from subcellular to tissue levels and discover novel therapeutics for human disease.
AEROSPACE/MECHANICAL ENGINEERING LAB
Hands-on applications of combinations of mechanical systems, electrical systems, and optics. This lab is the foundation for senior design where students design and experiment their own research project for a semester.
STRUCTURES AND MATERIALS LAB
Research focused on improving the safety, sustainability, and serviceability of built infrastructure by conducting material, educed-scale, and full-scale structural testing.
ROBOTICS OF AUTONOMOUS SYSTEMS (ACT)
ACT Lab conducts research in the area of coordinated multi-robot systems. The common theme behind our different research threads is that we provide theoretically sound solutions to practically motivated problems.
ENVIRONMENTAL ENGINEERING LAB
Exploring wastewater reuse, desalination, and detection of chemical contaminants to provide holistic and realistic solutions to the problem of finite water and energy resources.
COMBUSTION AND FUELS RESEARCH LAB
Combustion research with applications in the engines of cars, aircraft, and rockets.
STUDENT ORGANIZATIONS
There are many ways to get involved at Viterbi.
Many of our student organizations will be in attendance to tell you what their group does and share their experiences with you. This is a great way to see how students spend some of their free time on campus.

Diversity Organizations
The Center for Engineering Diversity is the home of our diversity related organizations including Society of Women Engineers, National Organization of Black Engineers, Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, Queers in Engineering, Science, and Technology, Girls in Tech USC, among others.
Innovation Organizations
Got an idea? Interested in start-ups and entrepreneurship? Check out these student orgs that are focused on innovation & entrepreneurship: SparkSC, LavaLab, 3D4E (3D printing for everyone), and more!


Professional Organizations
Professional organizations from a variety of majors will be at the EXPO to tell you about what resources and events they have for students in terms of professional development, social opportunities, service, and more. This also encompasses Greek life, honor societies, and more!
Design Teams
Many students spend their free time building tangible products in student led design teams. Our EXPO will showcase airplanes designed by Aerodesign Team, Concrete Canoe made by the American Society of Civil Engineers, a formula-style race car from SC Racing, and more!

Check out some of the awesome student organizations in Viterbi:
- 3D Printing 4 Everyone (3D4E)
- Alpha Omega Epsilon
- American Institute of Chemical Engineers
- American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE)
- American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME)
- Associated Students of Biomedical Engineering (ASBME)
- Association for Computing Machinery
- AthenaHacks
- Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUV) Design Team
- Code the Change (CtC)
- Construction Management Association of America (CMAA)
- Corpus Callosum
- CybOrg
- Engineers Without Borders
- Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE)
- Institute of Industrial & Systems Engineers (IISE)
- Makers
- MEDesign Medical Device Design Team
- National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE)
- Queers in Engineering, Science, and Technology (QuEST)
- Recumbent Vehicle Design Team
- Robogals
- Scope
- Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers (SHPE)
- Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE)
- Society of Women Engineers (SWE)
- Scope USC
- SC Solar Car Team
- Spark SC
- Theta Tau
- USC 3D (printing) For Everyone
- USC Aerial Robotics
- USC Racing
- USC Rocket Propulsion Lab
- VEX Robotics
DIRECTIONS & PARKING
Discover USC is a rain-or-shine event
Transportation to Campus
We encourage you to take the Metro Expo Line to campus. Exit the train at the Expo Park/USC stop and enter campus on Trousdale Parkway. Head north to the check-in tables.
Directions and Parking
If you plan to drive to campus for our Discover USC Open House, please follow these directions. Parking will be free of charge and available at the McClintock Ave Entrance (formerly Gate 5), Downey Way Entrance (formerly Gate 6) and Jefferson Blvd Entrance (formerly Gate 8). Click here for a USC map listing entrance locations.
- From the I-10 Santa Monica Freeway, exit at Vermont Avenue heading south.
- From the I-110 Harbor Freeway, exit at Martin Luther King Boulevard and head west until you reach Vermont Avenue. Make a right and head north on Vermont.
- Enter campus at Entrance 5, located at Jefferson Boulevard & McClintock Avenue (section D2 on the USC map); at Entrance 6, located at Vermont Avenue and 36th Street (section A4 on the USC map); or at Entrance 8, located on Jefferson Boulevard between Vermont and Orchard Avenues (section B2 on the USC map).
- Notify the attendant that you are attending the Discover USC program. The attendant will provide you with a parking permit and direct you to the appropriate parking structure.