Education, 2017 Benefits and Challenges of Transitioning to Community Service Multidisciplinary Capstone ProjectsAbstractSignificant research has shown the positive benefit of service and community-based learning onstudent diversity, engagement, and retention. Elements of service-learning have beenincorporated across disciplines into traditional classes as well as capstone experiences. Whileproviding significant benefits, challenges also exist in managing relationships with externalclients, finding administrative support for these experiences, and engaging students in moreopen-ended projects.Recognizing these benefits, new capstone projects have been introduced at our mid-sized mid-Atlantic college over the last two
Paper ID #21735Effects of Service-Learning Projects on Capstone Student MotivationDr. Jason Forsyth, York College of Pennsylvania Jason Forsyth is an Assistant Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at York College of Penn- sylvania. He received his PhD from Virginia Tech in May 2015. His major research interests are in wearable and pervasive computing. His work focuses on developing novel prototype tools and techniques for interdisciplinary teams.Dr. Mark M. Budnik, Valparaiso University Mark M. Budnik is Paul H. Brandt Professor of Engineering at Valparaiso University. Prior to joining the faculty at
different departments represented by studentsmajoring in Mechanical Engineering, Mechanical Engineering Technology, ElectricalEngineering, Computer Engineering and Computer Science. This paper will present an overviewof the multidisciplinary capstone project, the lessons-learned from running several iterations ofthe project and recommendations for further improvements. It will present ideas and methodsthat should assist faculty at other small institutions in implementing similar contest-basedmultidisciplinary capstone project.1. IntroductionThe value of competition based senior design projects has been reported across numerousdisciplines. Electrical engineering students have created micromouse and line-maze solvingrobots1, while electrical and
becoupled to the departmental capstone courses to promote quick adoptions of multidisciplinarycapstone projects without sacrificing discipline specific rigor. Two student surveys and one end-of-quarter grading rubric are used to assess the merits of the coupled course design through thefirst quarter of a three quarter capstone series. Results of the surveys show that the SMCCcourse structure resolves student meeting scheduling problems by mandating attendance andretains departmental rigor by having advisors directly assigned in the departmental capstonecourse. We found that highly motivated teams with defined projects thrive with this model butthat industry-defined projects require increased communication for all involved faculty andindustry
capstone course requires significant faculty resources. The number of faculty represented in each project is displayed in Figure 5. The figure represents all faculty appointments to the class including lead faculty and mentor faculty. Lead faculty primary responsibility for the class, including curriculum development, representation at all lecture and studio hours, and final grading. Mentor faculty are provided to assist with advising students in given areas of expertise, providing direction and feedback during each semester. Page 26.1011.6
projects in a collaborative environment. Yet, anoverwhelming majority of programs do not provide students with the chance to workcooperatively across disciplinary lines. Those that do typically only allow for interactionbetween groups within the same overarching discipline such as Mechanical or ElectricalEngineering. Ideally, the capstone experience is meant to foreshadow the type of interaction andwork that a student will engage in, easing their transition into the work environment followinggraduation. In industry, engineers are expected to work collaboratively with experts in severaltechnical and non-technical domains. Subsequently, capstone classes are lacking the ability toprepare undergraduate students for membership on the interdisciplinary
diversity, quality, and rigorthe characteristics necessary to serve a 21st-century nation and world. Capstone projects arewidely acknowledged as important components in engineering, engineering technology, design,and business undergraduate education.2,6,15Much has been written on the topic, particularly on capstone courses in engineering.6, 17 Someresearchers have focused on capstone programming and structure.13, 17, 18 Others haveemphasized multidisciplinary collaborations.10, 19, 20 A smaller amount of research has addressedthe assessment of student knowledge patterns in multidisciplinary environments.4, 21, 22 However,little research has examined the role of faculty and their beliefs on the success factors, as well as,time commitments for
. c American Society for Engineering Education, 2016 Exploring Innovation, Psychological Safety, Communication and Knowledge Application in a Multidisciplinary Capstone Design CourseAbstractIn recent years, engineering schools have been inspired by accreditation bodies to incorporatemultidisciplinary teaming in their curricula, and hence engineering schools have started to offermultidisciplinary capstone design courses. These courses give senior engineering studentsindustry/client based projects in order to prepare them for today’s diverse educational andprofessional work place. In contrast to monodisciplinary capstones, multidisciplinary capstonescreate a diverse team of students from
Engineering Projects* 3Design: Engineering for the Community* 3 Design: Invention and Innovation* 3 Capstone Design* 6 Capstone Design* 6 Engineering Total 51 Engineering Total 75 Physics 1, 2, and Lab 9 Physics 1, 2, 3 and Lab 12 Chemistry1 4 Chemistry 4 Basic Science Total 13 Basic Science Total 16 Calculus 1, 2, 3 12
Architectural Engineering. Here at Penn StateUniversity, architectural engineering (AE) encompasses: Mechanical HVAC Design, Lighting/electricalDesign, Structural Design and Construction Engineering and Management.The pinnacle of the program is the yearlong capstone with inherent multidisciplinary aspects to it. Withan industry interface, the capstone is critical to enrich the student experience in complex building designthrough simulating the project to be “more real world” than traditional capstones. This capstonedistinguishes itself by the level of relatively independent work done by the student teams (vs. teaching bythe faculty), heavy industry practitioner interactions, mentoring roles of the faculty and lastly, utilizingreal industry projects
make current efforts and practices more visible and accessible,including by identifying accredited programs, different formats and approaches tried, and types of capstonedesign experiences. Three phases of review were conducted with emphasis on multidisciplinary programs,multidisciplinary approaches, and multidisciplinary capstone, separately. The results reveal an increasing trendin the development of multidisciplinary engineering programs, the significant role of capstone projects infacilitating multidisciplinary engineering education, including integrated and real-world trends inmultidisciplinary capstone experiences. In addition, there are gaps in the literature that required more insightsregarding non-accredited programs, student outcomes
Biotechnology Park. In addition, he is currently CEO of SpherIngenics Inc. an early stage company focused on enhancing stem cell therapies for therapeutic and reconstructive procedures. Previously in academia, Bost was at the Georgia Institute of Technology where he developed the Master of Biomedi- cal Innovation and Development (BioID) Program. For six years, he was also director of the biomedical engineering capstone design courses and sophomore introductory course for medical engineering design. During this time, over 200 BME capstone teams worked on projects with clinicians, surgeons, non-profit medical organizations, and medical industry companies to create unique solutions for improved patient care. Prior to
engineering faculty advisor, principal investigator and project manager over thepast eight years on WERCware has also been a valuable learning experience and significantprofessional development opportunity for this author, much more than advising the former once-and-done senior capstone projects typical of our previous undergraduate curriculum. Theongoing multiyear project curriculum encourages continuity of focus, with opportunities todevelop long-term relationships while working toward meeting and satisfying real communityneeds. Learning to address the social need of those with high functional autism and othercognitive and behavioral disabilities brings the technology in a unique direction (e.g., exploringBiometric sensors to select the best
-enhanced JIL-enhanced Senior enhanced enhanced e capstone capstone capstone capstone capstone It is to be mentioned that although all student in each of the designated courses wererequired to participate in this project, the number of participating students used for this paper wastaken from the survey responses which was voluntary. Students in the course were asked to goonline and fill the surveys but were not obliged to that. This method carries with it an inherentnon-response bias. Participant who chose not to answer surveys are not included in the results. Inaddition, allowing voluntary survey-taking
Newswander identified 5 themes of assessing multidisciplinary work: disciplinarygrounding, integration, teamwork, communication and translation across discipline boundaries,and critical awareness [6]. Multiple studies have explored the aspects of multidisciplinary teamoutcomes for capstone design teams [7,8]. Other studies have explored the possibility ofmultidisciplinary teams in a variety of other courses including having a multidisciplinary groupof faculty teach general engineering classes during the first-two years of study [4].Since service-learning projects often require both engineering and non-engineering knowledgefor successful deployment, having students from a variety of backgrounds, including non-engineering, can be valuable. While
vice-versa) unless theindividual student seeks it out. Anecdotal evidence suggests it is extremely difficult forinterested art students to enroll in engineering courses. Programmatic strictures in both art andengineering can often work against such enrollment special cases.Utilizing projects like senior design or other engineering capstones, the departments within thehumanities can be served by the technical fields, thus increasing the capabilities of thatdepartment. There are benefits to such projects for all participants, from exposing students todifferent ways of thinking, seeing, and communicating, to specific outcomes such as broadeningunderstanding of principles of engineering and design. In engineering practice, the ability towork with
Paper ID #23915Architecture, Engineering, and Construction Interdisciplinary Senior Inter-disciplinary Project Educational ModelDr. Jinsung Cho, California State Polytechnic University Pomona My name is Jinsung Cho, an assistant professor of Civil Engineering Department in California State Poly- technic University Pomona. I have had more than 18 years in both academia and Civil and Construction Industry. My specialty is the behavior of underground infrastructure, Trenchless and Tunneling Technol- ogy, as well as 3D Virtual Construction Design & Management. I am a reviewer or member of several professional
education.12 In literature, themost popular way of integrating real-world problem solving, especially in multidisciplinaryteams, seems to be through capstone design courses. As of 2005, roughly 35% of undergraduatecapstone design projects were conducted in multidisciplinary teams of students (an increase from21% in 1994).6 Evidence has shown, both qualitatively and quantitatively, that students benefitgreatly from working in multidisciplinary settings. Survey results show that engineeringprofessionals associate interdisciplinary thinking with creativity in their peers and ratemultidisciplinary work as very important in preparation for industry.7 Similarly, students whoparticipated in a multidisciplinary capstone course identified functioning in a
, vertically integrated, project-based engineering program. QScience Proceedings, page 73, 2015. ISSN 2226-9649. [3] Stuart Palmer and Wayne Hall. An evaluation of a project-based learning initiative in engineering education. European Journal of Engineering Education, 36(5):357–365, 2011. doi: 10.1080/03043797.2011.593095. [4] Robert H Todd, Carl D Sorensen, and Spencer P Magleby. Designing a senior capstone course to satisfy industrial customers. Journal of Engineering Education, 82(2):92–100, 1993. ISSN 2168-9830. [5] Nathan Hotaling, Barbara Burks Fasse, Lewis F Bost, Christopher D Hermann, and Craig R Forest. A quantitative analysis of the effects of a multidisciplinary engineering capstone design course. Journal of Engineering
high impactpractices: undergraduate research and collaborative assignments/projects. In some majors, students canfulfill their capstone or culminating design requirements through VIP, thus incorporating another highimpact practice (capstone projects).In a nationwide study of undergraduate research experiences, Russell, Hancock and McCullough foundthe overall duration of research experiences to be correlated with positive outcomes [4]. The benefit oflonger research experiences complements the structure of VIP, as returning students take on increasinglevels of responsibility and serve as student leaders. To facilitate longer-term student participation, VIPcourses are offered in 1-credit and 2-credit increments, with two semesters of
capstone, while giving them experience that could bolster their future employment opportunities. • Develop a project that would engage student interest and possibly provide for friendly competition. The project should be “fun” even when requiring hard work; • Select a project that would be palatable to overall faculty within the college of engineering; • Maintain a budget affordable for students; • Utilize existing resources available (i.e., Makerspace); and • Develop curriculum that scaffolds the students through the design process, and also includes elements of project management, teaming and other “soft skills”.With these goals in the forefront, the instructor team began to consider project ideas
addressing aunique shortcoming that exists in the SE field, and SE Student 1 does not think he would gain thesame amount of engineering insight in a traditional senior capstone project. In addition, SEStudent 1 believes that creating his own deliverables and setting his own schedule has benefitedthe quality of work he has produced and is similar to conditions in industry, which he would notexperience within a senior capstone project.SE Student 2:SE Student 2 believes travelling to Mexico City on a reconnaissance mission and working withexperienced academics and industry professionals has led to better understanding of conceptsfrom SE coursework. This in-field learning experience allowed her to collect source data for themultidisciplinary project
appropriately, a capstone program will be unable to evaluate them. Agroup of program leaders thus identified for each ABET criterion (see Table 2 for sample, andAppendix A for full table) and each KSA (see Appendix B) how AerosPACE and ICED align tothe regulatory requirements. For this purpose criteria were evaluated at the capstone course level,considering both semesters of each project (AerosPACE and ICED) as one. Table 2 shows justone example how both programs not only provide an opportunity to work in multidisciplinaryteams, but also provide robust evaluation thereof through the means of an online interactionplatform. Page 26.646.7
again as different majors to form multidisciplinaryteams and work on industry-sponsored projects; the Global Multidisciplinary Design Project(GMDP) extends the boundaries of capstone design projects to involve internationalcollaborations; liberal arts courses broaden students’ horizon beyond engineering fields and helpstudents to think about engineering problems from different perspectives. The JI offers minors innon-engineering fields including entrepreneurship, data science, and computer science, toprovide concentrated studies in the non-engineering fields. Through the engineering curricula,our goal is to train effective engineers with interdisciplinary experience, technical knowledge,innovative minds, a deep understanding of professional
-offs, and justification of their Page 26.531.9recommendation and analysis process. The deep learning assignments are meant to give undirectedopportunities to scaffold and prepare students to apply course concepts to their capstone project. Each deep learning assignment provides a scenario to give context to the analysis as well as create theaffective hook. Following the information are the instructions, which are organized according to thefive stage analysis process. Additionally, the goal of the assignment, the deliverables, and how theassignment will be evaluated are given. An example of a deep learning assignment is given in
question,estimating the scope of the project, writing an acceptable statement of work, completing theproject, and delivering results that could be readily disseminated.The undergraduate engineering curriculum at our institution has built-in project-basedcornerstone, sophomore, and senior capstone design courses. The master of engineering is a 30credit course-only program. By leveraging these two curricula, we developed a successfulmultidisciplinary modeling course where key learning outcomes strengthen student readiness toperform research. This paper describes the evolution of our overall strategy to overcomechallenges and put solutions in place. An overview of the course is presented in the context ofhow the pedagogy of student research has
. Prior to joining QUEST, Jessica was the Graduate Assistant in Columbia University’s Office of Student Engagement.Ms. Amanda Yard, University of Maryland, College Park Amanda Yard is a graduating senior from the University of Maryland, Robert H. Smith School of Busi- ness. She is receiving a major in Supply Chain Management and a minor in Spanish Language and Cultures. She will be working for PepsiCo as an Integrated Supply Chain Associate in Schaumburg, IL. Amanda has been a member of the QUEST Honors Program since Spring 2013 where she has served as a mentor, as well as on the capstone project scoping team. c American Society for Engineering Education, 2016 Impact of
graduates? What are the most important skills, abilities, qualifications that employers are looking for today? What do alumni think about technical and professional qualifications and skills of the new graduates? 3. Alumni Experiences with Design Education: What were alumni experiences with design courses during their undergraduate studies? Based on alumni feedback, how can we enhance engineering design education? What do alumni think about the first-year common design course and transdisciplinary capstone courses?As part of the project, the purpose of the focus groups was to collect the first-hand informationfrom the Faculty alumni regarding their experiences in industry to properly enhance the overalldesign curriculum, account for
majors in the industrial setting, were reported. Arduino has beenwidely used for teaching junior and senior level controls [3]-[9] and microprocessor courses [10],computer engineering capstone projects [11], and communication systems courses [12].Arduino has also been widely used in lower-division courses. For freshman engineering students,Arduino was used as a platform to teach programming, design, and measurement [13]. In thiswork, the authors transited the Living with the LAB curriculum, which used the Boe-Bot mobilerobotics and the Basic Stamp microcontroller, to the Arduino platform. In [14], Sullivan et al. usedArduino in an Introduction to Mechanical Engineering course where freshman students designedand implemented a cornerstone project
be continuing to develop new ways to fund these experiences and working withother collaborators to continue to add value to the exhibits.ReferencesChua, K. (2014). A comparative study on first-time and experienced project-based learning students in an engineering design module. European Journal of Engineering Education, 39, 556-572.Dunlap, J. C. (2005). Problem-based learning and self-efficacy: How a capstone course prepares students for a profession. Educational Technology Research and Development, (1), 65-85.Fitzgerald, H., Bruns, K., Sonka, S., Furco, A., & Swanson, L. (2015). The centrality of engagement in higher education. APLU Council on Engagement and Outreach. Retrieved from http