Lovegroove
I do think that a lot of the college courses appear to be a bit detached from real world applications
That's because new applications keep coming along. The only common thread with UAVs is what the three letters stand for, and the last one is pretty vague anyway. As no man is required onboard, the size can be the smallest that is needed to do the job. A UAV doesn't have to be Global Hawk or even Desert Hawk size to have a serious application.
When one thinks of the most widely used computer applications these days, they are more than likely not to be the ones that were forecast thirty years ago. For all we know in 30 years time, the best selling UAV might be a 'flying duster' that goes around room gathering cobwebs. The video game industry grew out of flight simulator graphics technology, and I would hazard a guess that the video game industry is worth a fair bit more than its parent now.