”1 state: “It is said that there is nothing so practical as goodtheory. It may also be said that there’s nothing so theoretically interesting as goodpractice.” Marquardt2 in his “Harnessing the Power of Action Learning” states “...allforms of action learning share the elements of real people resolving and taking action onreal problems in real time and learning while doing so.” This is what our educational approach to engineering technology education has been allabout. To address these issues, we create laboratory problems, institute engineering coopprograms, and do capstone projects, all to get students exposed to “real world problems”.These are all excellent approaches and should be applied wherever practical. There areproblems associated
selective demolition and remodeling course, and a“capstone”-style course in demolition and reconstruction management are planned to round outthe specialization. These three courses provide an opportunity to further address areas that cannotbe adequately covered in an introductory course. The addition of more case studies and field tripswill be beneficial and could be incorporated into the capstone course which likely will include aformal laboratory session. The inclusion of detailed case studies in the capstone course willallow students to gain insight into the information and challenges an owner or developer mustsift through and overcome while generating a pro forma for a project. A significant portion of thecapstone course would be devoted to
great interest within academia is the ownership of student-generated intellectualproperty (IP), particularly in an era when entrepreneurship and innovation are being stressedacross academic disciplines. Students involved in engineering capstone design projects, businessplan courses and competitions, and research activities have immense potential to conceive andprototype product, process, system, and service concepts within the university classroom andlaboratory environment. Faculty members serving as mentors and liaisons to industry partnersgenerally facilitate the innovation process in the context of their employment as universityprofessionals. The research questions addressed in this project focus on who actually owns theintellectual property
programs will face as they attempt to redefine themselves and emerge from an existing discipline in which they are firmly, and perhaps necessarily, rooted. The question, however, must be raised as to whether the specialty courses exist within the biological engineering program, or should students simply be directed to a different department to gain focus and specialization? A similar question arises as to the research opportunities for capstone design projects. At USU we have been bringing required courses into the Department (such as Thermodynamics and Modeling) in order to provide the necessary “bio” focus.• Absence of specialization. Trying to work outside of the department’s core expertise
V) or thestudent’s capstone design, which may include multidisciplinary projects (Design VI to VIII).In this paper the authors report on a pilot experience to design, develop, and implement changesto the first course of the design spine (Design I or E121), aimed at introducing the first elementsof a comprehensive approach rooted in “Total Design,” with implementation of other elements inother courses to follow. Total design9 is the systematic activity necessary, from the identificationof the market/user need, to the selling of the successful product to satisfy that need – an activitythat encompasses product, process, people and organization.Rationale for Total Design Engineering education is, by necessity, mostly concerned with the
challenge students. Since this is a first year class, the service learning project will be combined with the senior ENGR 490 Design Capstone class (see item 4 below). ENGR 490 students will act as mentors for ENGR197 students, engaging them as an integral part of the design and implementation process, while exposing them to team-based interaction. 2. Microcontroller Systems I (ENGR 260). The experience-based learning concept is newly incorporated into a traditional microprocessor class for sophomore level design. This class will provide students with hands-on experience for community or industry. Faculty members will choose a project appropriate for sophomore students from those supplied by the
besteducational results for the students while alleviating safety concerns.The advisor can influence the scope of the design, the project management, and other details.How much they influence the design can have a significant influence not only on the results atcompetition, but also on the experience gained by the students. In addition to directly advisingthe team, institutional changes may also be necessary. For example, to reduce the load on anindividual advisor, we are experimenting with two-year design cycles and subsystemdevelopment using our senior capstone design class. Time will tell what improvements result.The competition organizers establish the allowable development time, event timing, and designassessments. They may also want to consider
? Reflective Observation (Watching) Active Experimentation (Doing) Open-ended problems/ laboratories Role playing/ journal writing Capstone/ design undergraduate research Field trips/ simulations Group problem solving/ project reports Motivational examples/ stories Think tanks/ student lectures Interactive discussion/ lecture Problems prepared by students Class/group discussion Homework problems/ guided
teamwork and communication, and is not effectively taughtby lecture, cookbook labs, or emphasizing analytical solution techniques. To communicateconcepts and skills requires students to both develop an understanding of concepts and to testthat understanding by applying the concepts and skills. Application serves as formative Page 11.1424.2 1 This work is funded by the National Science Foundation under grants: 0230695 & 0311257.evaluation. VECTOR is a project-based approach to EM in which student teams develop andevaluate their grasp of concepts through application in a complete project design-build-test cycle.The introductory EM
phosphorus from sewage using Tanzaniaas a model developing country.Course FormatThe year-long P3 project was performed under the umbrella of existing courses offered at theUniversity of Cincinnati, namely CEE 600/601 Chemistry and Microbiology of EnvironmentalSystems/Lab and the Environmental Capstone course, EVST 501.CEE 600/601 Chemistry and Microbiology of Environmental Systems/Lab brings togetherundergraduate and first year graduate students from the Department of Civil and EnvironmentalEngineering as well as senior students from the Environmental Studies Program. As aninterdisciplinary course involving environmental engineers and scientists, CEE 600/601facilitates the commencement of a year-long independent study by the student design team
both analog and digital components. Some installations requirePLC programming, other installations require computer programming. RFID is a field where acomprehensive ECET education can be put to use.An RFID course is an appropriate capstone for an AS degree program for two reasons. First, itcan give students a chance to reach the “synthesis” level of learning. After taking introductorycourses in RF, computer networking, and controls, RFID allows students integrate these separate“silos of knowledge” into one system. The second reason for presenting RFID in the AS degreeis that the level of knowledge required is appropriate for sophomore ECET students. Because ofthe RFID manufacturers’ desire to make their equipment user friendly, a great depth
amount of copper in the crushed car during recycling. This was achieved with the useof inexpensive breakaway connectors at each point where the power line branched off toa component. Telephone conference calls with the industry professionals providedimportant context and background information for the project.This was a highly successful senior design project which can serve as a model in anumber of pedagogical areas including socially relevant design problems,interdisciplinary team building, interacting with industrial professionals and serving as anall around capstone experience to a student’s undergraduate engineering scienceeducation. Page
weight for these EM programs was higher than the proposed EMBoK.This is not surprising since all these topics are basic topics usually taught in undergraduateprograms. Capstones are a feature of and more prevalent in undergraduate programs. Page 11.425.6 5 of 8The three categories (1.B. Organizations; 2.B. Quantitative/Methodical; and 4.A. Project Mgt.)that were low are also not surprising since these topics are more advanced and taught in graduateprograms.Combining EM Graduate and Undergraduate Topic Weights.Exhibit 6 combines the graduate and undergraduate averages and then compares them to theweights
undergraduate studentscould earn. This would be similar to other certificate programs, such as the Certificate inInternational Engineering in German (http://engineering.colorado.edu/academics/german_faq.htm). The changes in the freshman course would be an opportunity to spark studentinterest in the EDC program. Many other courses have also incorporated international aspectsinto the curriculum. Sections of the three-credit Freshman Projects course emphasizeappropriate technologies for the developing world. Within the Civil and EnvironmentalEngineering degrees, lectures have been added to address water and sanitation appropriate forrural areas and developing communities. Since 2001, some of the capstone design projects havealso worked with international
ofengineering education would be required as part of the EC2000 requirements for ABETaccreditation. All engineering students began taking a course called Introduction toEngineering Design during the sophomore or junior year. One credit of that four-credit coursewould be entitled Professional Development I and would be taught by the Archer Center. Inaddition, the Archer Center would teach a culminating course, Professional Development III,for students who were simultaneously enrolled in the Capstone Design Course. (A third course,Professional Development II is taught at Rensselaer in the School of Humanities and SocialScience, and is completely independent of the Archer Center sequence. It will not be describedin the present paper.)The addition of these
the bulk ofthe curriculum. ABET addressed this danger with a capstone-design requirement that combineseconomic, social, environmental, and other considerations realistically.15 If students are toexperience engineering in context, that context must be integrated into the overall experience,not offered as a series of separate issues.Understanding that policy and technology constantly influence and constrain one anotherbecomes significant in preparing engineering students for the conflicting problems andopportunities within our society. The immediate challenge lies in finding projects in which theoutcome heavily depends on both engineering development and attention to policy regulations.As a current and significant application, building energy
country.Following a rigorous preparation program in the US, students use their technical, language, andcross-cultural skills in a capstone co-op assignment abroad. The combination of skills acquiredthrough the professional practice and language/culture programs creates a structure whichattracts highly-motivated students, and allows them to succeed in an international workenvironment1.About ten percent of all engineering students (over 200 to date) participate in the ICP. Thestrengths to the UC program are: 1) Students complete four co-op quarters in the US, prior to aninternational co-op assignment and 2) An intensive language program comprised of over 300classroom hours of German, Japanese or Spanish was created specifically for students preparingto live
build bio-mimicked layered composites. Labview™ virtualinstruments (VIs) were developed to guide the robots, to actuate injectors, and to analyzeimages. The implications of this work for the projects assigned at the undergraduate levelas well as students’ capstone project will also be discussed.IntroductionIn the aftermath of the major disasters that claimed human lives and caused extensivefinancial losses, it is necessary to develop materials that resistant to powerful forces ofnature. Most buildings, especially in the third world countries are built from manuallylaid clay bricks (unfired or fired) in layered structures with mud or gypsum mortarinterlayers. In the event of an earthquake or other disasters that exert dynamic shearforces on
IBM, as well as owning a management consulting firm, Executive Education Services. Her research interests are in electronic marketing, multidisciplinary education, and entrepreneurial ventures.Susannah Howe, Smith College Susannah Howe is the Design Clinic Director in the Picker Engineering Program at Smith College. She coordinates and teaches the capstone engineering design course and serves as co-faculty advisor for entrepreneurial activity at Smith. Her interests include innovations in engineering design education, entrepreneurship education across disciplines at the undergraduate level, and durability and structural performance of cementitious and natural building materials.Robert Weissbach
or full-time undergraduate students in Prescott. The topic of spacedebris was introduced in these classes and it was found that this field can serve as a veryelaborate example pool for applied orbital mechanics, mission planning, spacecraft design (busand payload), remote sensing and space surveillance, and classes in a traditional liberal artscurriculum such as history, policy, and law.Projects like the analysis of satellite fragmentations, interactive web based flux directionalitycalculations, and the long term effects of perturbations on a satellite’s orbit are a few exampleson how this important topic can be included in a university curriculum. Undergraduate studentshave been integrated into research projects in addition to the classes
department structure with two small programs than to have two small autonomous departments. 2. Sharing of resources between the programs. Both engineering and ET programs at OIT pride themselves on the hands-on nature of their curriculum which means lots of laboratories and laboratory equipment. With this much equipment, sharing of resources is a necessity. 3. Sharing of faculty between the programs. Faculty can specialize in the types of courses that they are experts in whether it is engineering or ET. Faculty is encouraged to associate with both programs. Enhanced interaction between engineering and ET students can lead to joint capstone projects which simulate real-life situations. 4. Sharing of common
-based teaching and learning. Clearly, implementing new processes ofassessment of outcomes for ABET is having a significant effect on our programs. We have beenfortunate to have other influences, as well, including good counsel from external advisory boardsand the resources from an endowed center for engineering education, both of which have beeneffective in fostering change.Over the last 15 years, these diverse drivers for change have nurtured nearly 50 major projectsfor which substantial funding was available. These 50 initiatives, however, do not begin torepresent the totality of the effort because many individual faculty and small groups of facultycarried out projects to improve what they are doing in their own classes without the benefit
] describe a project initiated by Texas A&MUniversity to address issues in manufacturing at the nanoscale. The project will introducenanotechnology concepts throughout the undergraduate engineering curriculum. The curricularchange introduced by this project has four components corresponding to the four years ofundergraduate engineering curricula. At each level, concepts related to manufacturing at thenanoscale are introduced at the appropriate technical level.Alpert, Isaacs, Barry, Miller, and Busnaina [4] describe various nanotechnology educationinitiatives undertaken by University of Massachusetts, Lowell. One of the initiatives consists ofstarting a cross disciplinary graduate certificate in nanotechnology and nanoscience in Fall 2005.This
,updated and changed at regular intervals. The support system is designed and intended fortutorials, discussions, and/or collaborations among students. The laboratory experiments anddesign projects will be developed by using software packages, available in WSU College ofEngineering, such as MATLAB/Simulink, LabVIEW and Interactive Data Language (IDL)1-5.An important part of second course, dealing with HPS, will be included in capstone designprojects2-5.Courseware: The courseware outlined by chapters covers the basic principles of renewableenergy sources up to the more advanced sections including hybrid power systems, distributedgeneration, power electronics and control, energy management, and data analysis andprocessing. The courseware contains
Radio1. Introduction This paper discusses the implementation of a course in software-defined radio (SDR)technology and systems. The course contains significant computer and hands-on project work inorder to implement working SDR systems. Focusing on SDRs provides a method to tie togethermany of the classes in a typical electrical engineering undergraduate’s curriculum: core coursessuch as Circuits and Devices, Signals and Systems, Embedded Microcontrollers, andEngineering Electromagnetics; as well as many of the popular elective courses such asCommunications, Controls, and Signal Processing. Building a functioning SDR system requiressome understanding of all of these topic areas. SDR is an emerging technology that promises to have a
such as EES, TK Solver,CyclePad and FEHT.Students in this course were encouraged to use software to solve many of homework problems,as well as the projects. The approach used in this course was to present examples and solutionsin MATLAB and EXCEL because these packages are taught to students in our program in a“computer-tools” class. However, students were allowed to use any software package that theydesire. During one seventy-five minute lecture, two example problems were worked in detailusing the thermodynamic cycle analysis software CyclePad.6 A screenshot of the CyclePadinterface is shown in Fig. 1. Page 11.81.4 Figure 1. Screen
. Hanson, New Mexico State University Professor, Department of Civil Engieering, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces, NM.Jeanne Garland, New Mexico State University Special Projects Coordinator, New Mexico Alliance for Minority Participation, College of Engineering, New Mexico State Universtiy, Las Cruces, NM. Page 11.796.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2006 Integrating Writing to Provide Context for Teaching the Engineering Design ProcessIntroduction“Fundamentals of Environmental Engineering” is a junior course taught in the Civil Engineeringdepartment at New
-Req X X Lab II Report Stu-Req X X Capstone Design Project Stu-Req X X Multidisciplinary Team Project Stu-Req X X Ethics Project Stu-Req X X Heat and Mass Transfer Project Stu-Opt X Fluid Mechanics Project Stu-Opt X Reactor Design Project Stu-Opt X Separations Project Stu-Opt
engineering undergraduate students are required to take atwo-semester (6-credits) capstone design course sequence. The course sequence represents theculmination of the students’ undergraduate engineering training and education. Student teamsinterested in the power engineering field have the opportunity to select a design project thatcomplements their interest in the energy sector. For example, last year eight students from theelectrical and mechanical specialties investigated the CSM campus energy needs for the year2020 and beyond. Working closely with the campus architect, CSM plant facilities, XcelEnergy, NREL, and the group of power faculty, the students developed a detailed technicalengineering study focusing on the reliability and sustainability
” engineering practice and approximating professional practice. Course Title: Senior Project From the Syllabus: To provide senior students an opportunity to acquire a working understanding of the principles of mechanical engineering through a capstone design project. The emphasis of the course is on guiding students in the design process while working in teams. To prepare the senior undergraduate student for the industrial work environment, to develop professional skills of the students, and to apply fundamental. basic scientific and engineering principles to a design that satisfies a need.Another, increasingly common, design experience course is the introductory complement to thecapstone design course: the