them into a successful capstone experience. The pre-junior humanities component of the course is re-introduced via technical report writing, projectposter board development, and PowerPoint presentations. Similarly, the associate degree level ofElectrical Engineering Technology coursework is re-introduced via a pressure sensor projectcomprised of a collection of analog and digital circuits studied during the first two years ofcollege. The paper presents the "project philosophy" together with specific technical andhumanities project components. Students can work independently or in teams composed of twoor three students for the purpose of cost sharing. However, each student is required to build aproject prototype and write a project proposal. In
AC 2007-778: AN ALGORITHM FOR PROJECT ASSIGNMENT IN CAPSTONEDESIGNTheodor Freiheit, University of CalgaryJulian Wood, University of Calgary Page 12.196.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 An Algorithm for Project Assignment in Capstone DesignAbstractThis paper presents an algorithm to automate the assignment of students to project teams.Students bid on a limited set of choices of the projects being offered. The algorithm thenattempts to place students into projects such that the overall project assignment solution providesthe highest ‘satisfaction’. Satisfaction is defined by a scoring methodology for assigningstudents to their preferred project. The
© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Design–Build–Test BUV–A Senior Capstone Design ProjectAbstractStudents working toward baccalaureate degree in Mechanical Engineering Technology at theUniversity of Cincinnati are required to complete a “Design, Build, and Test” Senior CapstoneDesign Project. One of these capstone design projects was to build a Basic Utility Vehicle(BUV). It was geared to meet the needs of developing countries for an affordable transportation.BUV competition is sponsored by IAT–Institute for Affordable Transportation, a non-profitorganization in Indianapolis, IN. IAT's mission is to improve the living standards and enableeconomic growth in the developing world by
12.449.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Design–Build–Test Autocross–A Senior Capstone Design ProjectAbstractStudents working toward a baccalaureate degree in Mechanical Engineering Technology at theUniversity of Cincinnati are required to complete a “Design, Build, and Test” senior capstonedesign project. One of these capstone design projects was to design and build an Autocrossracing vehicle. This vehicle was built to meet the Sports Car Club of America (SCCA)Autocross specifications, and was tested in the local competition event.From the concept to the final working vehicle which meets SCCA’s specifications, there aremany challenges. In the 2005-2006 academic year, a team of
AC 2007-142: AIR FLOW TEST BENCH: A SENIOR CAPSTONE PROJECTRobert Choate, Western Kentucky University Robert Choate teaches thermo-fluid and professional component courses in Mechanical Engineering, including the Sophomore Design, Junior Design, the Senior ME Lab I and the ME Senior Project Design course sequence. Prior to teaching at WKU, he was a principal engineer for CMAC Design Corporation, designing telecommunication, data communication and information technology equipment.Kevin Schmaltz, Western Kentucky University Kevin Schmaltz teaches thermo-fluid and professional component courses in Mechanical Engineering, including the Freshman Experience course, Sophomore Design, Junior
complete. Thefirst semester of the senior project required the students to research the problem, submitweekly memos, midterm report of findings, and a final project proposal. After advisorinput and approval the second semester concluded the project with the designdocumentation and often the manufacturing of a device to satisfy the design problem.This course sequence is probably similar to many engineering or engineering technologydegree programs which offer the students a capstone project simulating a workplaceexperience. There are inconsistencies in this experience, because each faculty advisormay have different level of expectations, amount of contact with the group, and degree ofinstruction of design principles. The change implemented at
AC 2007-1534: DESIGN, FABRICATION AND TESTING OF A NOVEL UAV:CAPSTONE PROJECTJohn Rajadas, Arizona State University PolytechnicAlvin Post, Arizona State UniversityBradley Rogers, Arizona State UniversityRichard Cuprak, Arizona State University Polytechnic Page 12.467.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Design, Fabrication and Testing of a Novel UAV as a Multi-Year Capstone ProjectAbstractThis paper describes one recent multi-year Capstone project in the Mechanical &Manufacturing Engineering Technology (MMET) Department at Arizona State UniversityPolytechnic. Specifically, the project involves the design, development
AC 2007-1053: A CAPSTONE ANALOG INTEGRATED CIRCUITS PROJECT FORELECTRONICS ENGINEERING TECHNOLOGY MAJORSDavid Pocock, Oregon Institute of Technology DAVID N. POCOCK is an Associate Professor and is the Curriculum Coordinator and head of the Analog Block of the Electronics Engineering Technology department at Oregon Institute of Technology in Klamath Falls, OR. His main research interests are semiconductor device modeling, infrared focal plane arrays, nuclear radiation effects, and web-based real electronics labs for distance education.Kevin McCullough, Oregon Institute of Technology KEVIN MCCULLOUGH is a Senior at Oregon Institute of Technology in the Electronics Engineering Technology
AC 2007-2924: BENEFITS AND STRUGGLES OF USING LARGE TEAMPROJECTS IN CAPSTONE COURSESTroy Harding, Kansas State University-Salina Page 12.304.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Benefits and Struggles of Using Large Team Projects in Capstone CoursesAbstractComputer System Technology graduates should have strong conceptual and practical knowledgeas well as being able to work collaboratively at all levels of software development. One way tobring this all together is by using a capstone course involving a major semester-long teamproject.This paper will describe and compare the projects used in our capstone courses over the
AC 2007-2851: IMPACT OF STUDENT SELECTION OF DESIGN PROJECTS ONTEAM PERFORMANCEPeter Orono, Indiana University-Purdue University-IndianapolisStephen Ekwaro-Osire, Texas Tech University Page 12.827.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 IMPACT OF STUDENT SELECTION OF DESIGN PROJECTS ON TEAM PERFORMANCEAbstract In the capstone design courses, the instructor can choose among different strategies ofassigning students to project teams. One of these strategies allows the students select the projectthey would like to work on from a list. This sometimes proceeds in an ad-hoc manner. Currently,literature offers limited research that looks at
AC 2007-1699: USE OF ASSESSMENT SURVEY TO ASSIGN PROJECT TEAMSAND ROLESPromiti Dutta, Columbia UniversityAlexander Haubold, Columbia University Page 12.1526.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Use of Assessment Survey to Assign Project Teams and RolesAbstract:Effective assignment of teams and distribution of tasks within a group is an arduous task.Successful teams display harmony, successfully completed projects, and effective skill utilizationof all members. Weak teams demonstrate ineffective dynamics, poorly completed projects, andunderutilized team members. We propose a method to assign team members and to delegatemembers with equally weighted
AC 2007-758: DESIGN TEAM SKILLS CURRICULUM FOR INTERMEDIATELEVEL PROJECT CLASSSteven Zemke, Gonzaga University Steven Zemke is an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Gonzaga University. He teaches design classes at the sophomore, junior, and capstone level. His research pursuits are in the pedagogy of design. Steven received his Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering with a dissertation on pedagogy from the University of Idaho in 2005. Prior to teaching, Steven was a design engineer and engineering manager for 25 years.Diane Zemke, Gonzaga University Diane Zemke is a Doctoral Student in the Leadership Studies Program at Gonzaga University. Her interests include pedagogy, paradigms
Purdue University in 1996, and the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in mechanical engineering from Vanderbilt University in 1999 and 2001. In 2001 she joined the Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science Department at Rice University, where she is currently an Assistant Professor. Her current research interests include robotics, mechatronics, and engineering education. Page 12.855.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Improving Interdisciplinary Capstone Design Projects with Cooperative Learning in the Medi-Fridge ProjectAbstractAs research at many institutions becomes more and
development course, asenior capstone design course sequence, and a graduate level course in product development. Inall cases, the students started the task of setting functional requirements and target specificationsfor the product after following a structured methodology to identify the customer needs. In thispaper, the process followed, an assessment of the results obtained and suggestions for futureimprovement are discussed presenting examples taken from different projects carried out bystudents.IntroductionAt the present time many undergraduate engineering programs in the US include one or moredesign courses aimed at better preparing students for the “real world” practice of the profession.In addition to the traditional Senior Design Project or
students progress from basic data collection and reverse engineering projects throughmore open-ended, industry-sponsored capstone design experiences. The team ofmultidisciplinary faculty from Engineering and Communications who teach the sophomore levelcourses have observed the difficulty students have tackling the fundamental open-ended natureof true design problems and have subsequently revised the sequence. For the Fall of 2005 theSophomore Clinic sequence was revised to introduce Dym et al.’s converging-divergingframework for design by incorporating a series of three projects of increasing complexity withaccompany activities designed to reinforce the converging-diverging concepts. For the thirdproject in the series, roughly sixty students
AC 2007-1755: CHARACTERISTICS OF CAPSTONE DESIGN PROJECTS ATUNIVERSITIES IN US AND CHINA: AN ANALYSISTianrui Bai, Southwest Jiaotong UniversityJinwen Zhu, Missouri Western State UniversityVirendra Varma, Missouri Western State University Page 12.353.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Characteristics of Capstone Design Projects at Universities in US and China: An AnalysisAbstractThe objectives of the capstone or other integrating experiences in the engineering andtechnology curriculums are to: 1. Pull together the various diverse elements of thecurriculum, and 2. Develop student competencies in problem-solving utilizing bothtechnical and
, Middle Tennessee State University Mr. Taylor is the director of the machine tool technology in the Department of Engineering Technology and Industrial Studies at Middle Tennessee State University. He received his B. S. degree in Industrial Studies and M. S. degree in Engineering Technology and Industrial Studies from Middle Tennessee State University. Mr. Taylor teaches basic and advanced machine tool technology classes and helps the undergraduate students with their experimental vehicles project. He is well versed with the operation and maintenance of CNC and rapid prototyping machines. Page
AC 2007-2479: THE EFFECT OF SUB-CONTRACTING ON CONSTRUCTIONTIME FOR COMMERCIAL PROJECTS IN CHENNAI, INDIAI. Choudhury, Texas A&M University IFTE CHOUDHURY Ifte Choudhury is an Associate Professor in the Department of Construction Science at Texas A&M University. Dr. Choudhury has extensive experience as a consulting architect working on projects funded by the World Bank. His areas of emphasis include housing, alternative technology, issues related to international construction, and construction education. He is also a Fulbright scholar.Tharuna Khilathi, Texas A&M University THARUNA KHILATHI Tharuna Khilathi is an architect and a constructor by profession. She obtained a
must demonstrate that their students attain…an ability to function on multi-disciplinary teams.”1 This requirement can be met in a numberof ways, including a structured simulated experience or by an actual capstone project thatrequires the involvement of several disciplines.Our university offers a bachelor of science degree in engineering (general engineering) withconcentrations in biomedical (BME), computer (CE), electrical (EE), mechanical (ME), andmaterials joining engineering (MJE). Much of the curriculum is interdisciplinary. All engineerstake core courses including Statics, Dynamics, Circuits, Mechatronics, and Thermodynamics.Design projects have been included in several of these courses. In parallel, the Department ofEngineering
AC 2007-1788: MEASURING CUSTOMER PERCEPTIONS: A FOLLOW-UPCOLLABORATIVE PROJECT CONDUCTED BY STUDENTS FOR A MIDWESTTRUCKING COMPANYSorraya Khiewnavawongsa, Purdue UniversityKathryne Newton, Purdue UniversityEdie Schmidt, Purdue UniversityPatrick Green, Purdue University Page 12.1041.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Measuring Customer Perceptions: A Follow-Up CollaborativeProject Conducted by Students for a Midwest Trucking Company Page 12.1041.2AbstractCompanies are recognizing the benefits of working with universities on a variety of collaborativeprojects. The benefits, however, accrue to more than
interdisciplinary collaboration of electrical and mechanicalengineering students on a senior capstone design of an integrated technology High AltitudeBalloon (HAB) system. This project involves the design of a system with a smart high altitudeballoon that would reach an altitude of 100,000 feet and return safely to earth. Major challengesin this project were the efficient design of wireless communication modules, and radiation heattransfer analysis on the payload system. The electrical and computer engineering studentsfocused on wireless communication technology, control system design, and data analysis. Themechanical engineering students focused on the design aspects of payload, balloon fillingmechanism, flight path prediction based on the study of wind
, thestudents are well-prepared for their capstone design project.1. IntroductionTypically, a graduating engineering technology student will find a significant gap betweenwhat they learned in the classroom and what they face at work. The educational goal is toreduce the gap by giving students opportunities to work on practical projects in differentcourses and by creating an environment in the classroom/lab that is as close to the real worldas possible. A course project, designed to familiarize the students with real world productdevelopment processes, is discussed in this paper. The goals for the course project are threefold: to familiarize students with product development process; to familiarize students withtools commonly used in product development
serving a large and diverse constituency with limitedresources.IntroductionProject-based “capstone” design has become an integral component of the undergraduateengineering experience. Howe and Wilbarger1 surveyed over 400 programs in the 2005 NationalSurvey of Engineering Capstone Design Courses, a follow-up to a comprehensive surveyconducted by Todd in 19942. Last year’s ASEE conference contained a number of papers oncapstone design programs3-9, with many of them focusing on assessment practices and lessonslearned. Important benefits associated with collaborative design projects include: innovativeproblem solving, improved handling of complexity and ambiguity, enhanced communicationsskills and self-confidence, and improvements in team building
addition to the wind tunnel course, this laboratory is also utilized to some extent in five othercourses in the curriculum, including AET 210, Measurement & Testing, AET 300, AircraftDesign, AET 432, Applied Heat Transfer, MET 434, Applied Fluid Mechanics and MET460/461, Capstone Project. This facility has become an essential element of the MMETdepartment curricula not only for students within the aeronautical concentration, but within othermechanical concentrations and the Manufacturing Engineering Technology program. Inaddition, students from all MMET department programs are involved in applied projects ofinterest to the engineering industry.Facility DevelopmentA perfectly funded engineering or engineering technology program that focuses on
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. Theresponsibility for a third course, Professional Development II, was assumed by the School ofHumanities and Social Science; it was organized to be completely independent of the ArcherCenter sequence. All three of these experiences are described below in greater detail.The addition of these curricular components to the School of Engineering did not occur
to faculty, faculty to students,and students to students. Comparisons can be made between integrated and non-integratedteams.IntroductionA lot of progress has been made in recent years in improving engineering education, e.g.,emphasizing communication skills, working in teams, integration of computer-aided engineering(CAE), and capstone/senior design projects. Previous work by the authors has focused onimproving the integration of CAE1,2,3,4 into mechanical engineering programs. The goal of thispaper is to document efforts to improve the experiences of students working in project designteams. The strategy is to create integrated project teams from machine design, product design,and manufacturing courses to design and build a wide variety of
believe this structure could be extended to multi-disciplinary teams (e.g. ajoint capstone project between engineering and business), in which the modules provide flexibilityto structure different content for different groups and individuals participating on the teams.1 AppendixThe questions on the student survey were the following: 1. The module topics were important for the project. 2. The material covered in the modules was used in the project. 3. The project helped me understand the need for the material covered in the modules. 4. The module topics fit well together. 5. Covering several different topics together helped me understand the material for each topic better. 6. Covering several different topics
inwhich students design, build, and test a complex project. These programs are increasinglyindustry sponsored 1, and expose students to many of the real constraints engineers face.Capstone courses are the primary mechanism used by many universities for integratingcommunication, and teamwork skills and social, economic, and ethical issues into theengineering curriculum 2. The capstone concept has been extended by other schools such as theDesign4Practice program at Northern Arizona University and the projects program at WorcesterPolytechnic Institute 3-5 in which dedicated design courses are integrated into all four years of theundergraduate curriculum. Improvements in student performance following capstone programshave been observed in several
. Page 12.419.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2007 Creative Problem Solving in Capstone DesignAbstractThis paper describes the 2006/07 capstone design course at Michigan Technological University,which had 121 students assigned to 24 project teams. The teams were formed based on theHerrmann Brain Dominance Instrument (HBDI) results, sponsor requirements, student GPA andspecial qualifications. During the first semester, the emphasis of the course was on creativeproblem solving, team building, and learning the 12-step design process with the associateddocumentation and thinking skills. During the second semester, the emphasis shifted to designfor X. Other topics covered were prototyping, optimization and quality
AC 2007-2366: CAPSTONE DESIGN PROJECTS WITH INDUSTRY: USINGRUBRICS TO ASSESS STUDENT DESIGN REPORTSPatricia Brackin, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology M. PATRICIA BRACKIN is an Associate Professor of M.E. at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology where she teaches a variety of design courses, and graphics. Her BS and MS are from the University of Tennessee in Nuclear Engineering and her Ph.D. is from Georgia Institute of Technology in ME. She has also been an Associate Professor at Christian Brothers University. Her industrial experience includes Oak Ridge National Laboratories and Chicago Bridge and Iron. She is a registered PE.J. Darrell Gibson, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology