This weekend, 150 engineering students will learn how to deal with the challenges of the corporate world when they participate in the sixth annual Leaders of the Future National Engineering Conference.

The event will be held at the Keller Conference Center from 6 tonight until noon Sunday.

The 23 companies sponsoring the conference will present workshops and discussions on engineering topics and problems in the business world, said Scott Mowry, vice chairman of corporate sponsorship for the event.

Corporate presentations will address improving product quality and managing in the 1990s and in a diverse workforce, said conference chairman Dave Kodrin (senior-electrical engineering).

Leadership development workshops will include goal setting, public speaking and stress management, Kodrin said.

"The conference is intended to increase communication and leadership skills among engineering students and expose corporations to the more motivated engineering majors," Kodrin said.

Exxon, a sponsor, will hold an "innovation center" in which students can learn how to generate ideas to solve problems in the workplace as well as in their personal lives, said Melissa Stapleton, an engineer for Exxon Chemicals. In preliminary lectures at the Exxon workshop, students will learn how to broaden their ideas and see all possible solutions, she added.

"The conference gives us a chance to meet students we're interested in possibly hiring," she said. "We also have the opportunity to hear good ideas from students that our company could implement in the future."

Invitations were sent to all campus engineering societies and various universities across the country, Mowry (senior-engineering) said. Participants include 50 University engineering students and about 80 students from other schools, he added.

"The conference provides students with a network to get to know how other schools operate," Mowry said. "We get corporate perspectives on what we should be doing as engineering students."