Conference Session

Emerging Trends in Engineering Education Poster Session

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Murat Tanyel

Session xxxx HOT WHEELS®, BLACKBOARD AND LABVIEW – WHAT DO THEY HAVE IN COMMON? Murat Tanyel Geneva CollegeAbstractAfter nine years of keeping away from freshmen, I taught an “Introduction to Engineering”course this year. Although I had undertaken the project with great trepidation, the course turnedout to be one that I enjoyed teaching. In the lab, I introduced LabVIEW, a graphicalprogramming language for data acquisition, analysis and presentation. The course wassupplemented by the Blackboard

Conference Session

Curriculum Innovation & Assessment

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Thomas Krueger; Ted Aanstoos; Ronald Barr

in the awareness of programoutcomes and their importance in the curriculum. Many students see them as overly generalizedstatements that have no bearing on the concepts they need to pass a given course. Thus,dissemination of the notion and value of program outcomes is a major hurdle for the faculty.This paper suggests that engaging students at the freshman level in the departmental programoutcomes is one strategy to foster a climate of their acceptance in later courses. Examples offreshman class assignments and projects that address specific program outcomes in a MechanicalEngineering department are presented.IntroductionIn the mid-1990’s, the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) developeda new set of criteria for

Conference Session

Accreditation and Related Issues in ECE

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Kanti Prasad

A case study of eradicating weakness in accreditation owing to vital role played by industrial and government leaders in academia Kanti Prasad, Ph.D.; P.E. Professor, Electrical and Computer Engineering University of Massachusetts Lowell Lowell MA 01854 Kanti_Prasad@uml.eduIntroduction In the fall of 2000, we were visited by ABET for regular accreditation forour Electrical Engineering Program. We were cited ‘weakness’ in our course16.499 Capstone Project. Although the design content was of great quality, but itlacked in elucidating the design impact on society, its environmental implication,ethical content, and economic

Conference Session

Curriculum Development in Computer ET

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Jeffrey Lillie

survey of the typical college student showed that they love video images. It could be a videoclip captured with a digital camera, a digital video playing on their laptop, or digital images capturedwith their camera phone. This paper reviews and discusses how an FPGA platform was selected andintegrated with a QVGA(320x240) color display. It details how an eight lab sequence was developed toallow the students to accomplish a project goal of playing a video image sequence on the QVGAdisplay. This paper also illustrates how additional ABET outcomes such as applied technical problemsolving, technical writing, configuration management, team dynamics, communications, and ethics wereintegrated into the course content.IntroductionRochester Institute of

Collection

2005 ASEE Midwest Section Conference

Authors

Jason Moore; Mitchell A. Thornton; Ronald W. Skeith

such a language is not found, too much timeis wasted teaching the basics of new languages to cover all of those programming topics. Perl is aversatile enough language to cover all of these topics. At first, students are given small text manipulation programs to learn how to use regularexpressions, vi which is a common Unix text editor, and develop in a Linux environment. Theassignments gradually get larger with each requiring an additional skill to complete. All of theassignments build to a final project that requires a mastery of several skills to successfully finish.The class size is usually around 30 students. Students are given three examinations that test theprogramming skills learned from the assignments. Students are expected to

Collection

2005 ASEE Midwest Section Conference

Authors

Wangping Sun; J. M. Zhang; Z. J. Pei

Year Fig. 1. Enrollment for IMSE 564.2. Creation of the learner-centered environment in IMSE 564Learner-centered education was developed a long time ago, and it continues to take on differentshapes 2. The distinguishing characteristics of a learner-centered method are 3-5: • Curriculum based on learners’ needs; • Learners’ responsibility for contributing to their own learning; • Teacher's role as facilitator to guide education experience; • Group activities for practice and learning reinforcement; • Stimulus for discovery and self-learning; • Opportunities for discourse; • Stimulus for inner discipline; • Project-based learning; • Basis for learning throughout life.The

Conference Session

Engineering Education Research and Assessment I

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Frederick Berry; Patricia Carlson

rating and the average of ratings from all three peer reviewers.III. CPR and the Assessment of Learning through WritingCPR -- as an advanced form of educational technology -- partners both with the student and withthe instructor to foster learning. In this project, through the vehicle of CPR, we were able toimplement assignments that fully utilize the “writing across the curriculum” (WAC) pedagogy [3- 6], without overly increasing the workload for instructors. Furthermore, CPR’s ability both toelicit and to report qualitative and quantitative peer review helps to make formative assessmentan integral part of instruction. And, the data collected by CPR during the student’s process ofengaging the

Conference Session

Early College Retention Programs

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Yvonne Ng

students practice them in a “semi- professional” setting. Written communication, project planning, ethical decision-making and collaborative problem-solving are the essential “soft skills” required for success in any professional engineer. The freshman program at Bucknell University, for example, has students create an ADA-compliant project proposal for the university. This experience impresses upon the Page 10.1194.2 students the importance of making sound technical suggestions and being able to present the required information to persuade (often non-technical) decision makers about ethically

Conference Session

Tricks of the Trade for Research

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Jerry Samples

teamcan be effectively put together and run, the leader has a lot of preparation work to set the stagefor success. Maxwell provides ten steps that lead to personal organization – an important step inthe process of leading others. 1. “Set Your Priorities. Two things are difficult to get people to do. The first is to do things in order of importance, and the second is to continue doing things in order of importance.” Most people are distracted by email, phone calls or some of the other things listed above. They select the “hottest” project to start on, and then go to the next project that comes their way. As leaders, they need to be more focused so that they can focus those that work for them. Often, hot

Conference Session

Wider Contexts of Ethics for Engineers

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Sunil Sinha

.ABSTRACTConstruction courses in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at thePennsylvania State University focus on the subjects of planning, organization, monitoring andcontrol of the construction projects. There is currently a scarcity of information relating to ethicalconduct in these courses. Government regulations, environmental permits, and other bureaucraticcontrols continue to grow. Projects also continue to get larger and more technical, requiring morespecialized people, high-tech equipment, and better project control systems. This trend requiresthat project managers have technical, business, organizational, ethical, and leadership savvy.Many new regulations and specifications (for example, those of OSHA and ACI) requireconstruction

Conference Session

K-12 Poster Session

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Wayne Burleson; Noah Salzman; Christopher Emery; Kevin Kloesel; Sandra Cruz Pol; Omnia El-Hakim; Kathleen Rubin

theknowledge that they acquired in the content institute in their elementary, middle, and high schoolclassrooms. Collaboration among teachers from different states was encouraged during the weekthat the teachers were together, and the end of the course saw several exciting plans forcooperative projects in the future. Follow-up activities included developing a CD and web-basedarchive of the course, and the teachers returning to the University of Massachusetts to present onthe projects they developed. Page 10.298.1 Proceedings of the 2005 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright

Conference Session

Social Responsibility & Professionalism

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Christi Luks

Focus on Tar Creek Christi L. Patton University of TulsaAbstract Tar Creek is #1 on the EPA cleanup list and it is located about 90 miles from theUniversity of Tulsa campus. While the legislators and residents debate what should bedone to clean up the area, freshman Chemical Engineering students research the historyof Tar Creek and use this as a starting point for lectures and discussion on safety, ethicsand the environment. Throughout the course students perform practice calculations thatare based on the information gleaned through their readings. The last weeks of thesemester are spent in a research project that takes them to

Conference Session

Graduate Education in ET

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Mary Jane Parmentier; Rajeswari Sundararajan

its effects on societies and their economies, and how, in turn, socialchange influences technological advance. Thus, engineering students are exposed to graduatelevel theoretical foundations in the social sciences, and liberal art students are exposed to coursesin information technology software, transportation systems, technology forecasting, andsustainable energy studies. Because of the unique multidisciplinary curriculum that combinestechnology, social sciences, and international and comparative studies, students in this programare able to choose elective courses and theses or applied project topics from a wide variety offields, depending upon their academic backgrounds, strengths, and interests. The experience ofimplementing this

Conference Session

Building New Communities

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Karl Smith; Ronald Miller; Ruth Streveler

significance of the work, the process used, and what was learned 4. Has significance beyond the individual context 5. Breaks new ground or is innovative 6. Can be replicated or elaborated upon 7. Is judged to be meritorious and significant by a rigorous peer review process.In response to calls such as this and the urgent need for rigorous engineering education researchconducted by engineering faculty knowledgeable about the state-of-the-art in education researchmethods, the National Science Foundation has funded “Rigorous Research in EngineeringEducation: Creating a Community of Practice” (DUE-0341127). The goals of this project are to:• Create and present workshops for engineering faculty on conducting rigorous research in engineering

Conference Session

Controls, Mechatronics

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Viveca Deanes; Olakunle Harrison

scope of considerations practicing engineers face when designingcontemporary products that involve electromechanical devices. In this paper the authorsdescribe various approaches used in teaching this multidisciplinary course. Build-and-testexercises are used to help students gain a better understanding of technical concepts covered inthe course, thus promoting a sense of accomplishment with real world experiences. Students’ability to retain knowledge of concepts taught is improved when the opportunity exists todemonstrate what has been learned. The projects and exercises, as well as the way in which theyare executed, are designed to enhance students’ decision-making skills and promote goodengineering judgment. One course project discussed in

Conference Session

Curriculum Development in Computer ET

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Yong-Kyu Jung

classroom and industry?This question has been asked many times. In this paper we consider only the differences in thegoals, the quality and the scale of work between industry and academia. Because delivering themost marketable products in the shortest amount of time is critical in industrial projects, workingengineers are usually more interested in learning application-specific knowledge and skills as Page 10.179.1quickly as possible. On the other hand, engineering education usually deals with more general Proceedings of the 2005 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright

Conference Session

Best Zone Papers

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Robert Powell; Michael Kwinn

personnel to workon engineering projects, and by having the opportunity to expose future Army leaders to the vitalfunctions performed by their organization.This paper explores the uniqueness and nature of our work-based education program, itspurpose, our process for matching cadets with a participating agency and follow-up feedbackfrom students. The feedback is used to assess the viability of the program for future students andparticipating organizations. Additionally, this paper provides practical guidelines forimplementing such a program in any engineering curriculum to enhance a student’s engineeringeducation and learning.IntroductionIn the early 1980s, reformers became increasingly preoccupied with the effects of inadequateeducation of U.S

Conference Session

Innovation for ChE Student Learning

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

James Newell

Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright  2005, American Society for Engineering Educationactual projects, but because most projects last one year, ultimate conclusions must waituntil the early May submission of the final reports.Background and Pedagogical TheoryBehavioral scientists classify thought processes into cognitive and affective domains [1].The cognitive domain includes higher order thought processes such as logic andreasoning and is the primary (and in many cases, the only) target of engineering curricula.The affective domain includes attitudes, values, and self-concept. These attributestypically cannot be measured directly through exams and other classroom instruments,yet they are essential components

Conference Session

K-12 Poster Session

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Jeannie Brown Leonard; Taryn Bayles; Anne Spence

project is themodeling and design of a hot air balloon, which students built and tested. The hot air balloonhad to meet specific size, cost, time aloft and payload criteria. The program is a scaled-downversion of the Introduction to Engineering course that the authors teach at the University ofMaryland Baltimore County. At each seminar, the high school students learn engineeringfundamentals that relate to their design project and participate in hands-on activities andcompetitions. The students compete for prizes provided by Northrop Grumman. In most of thesessions, a technical expert presents material on topics related to their design project; examplesinclude: the Engineering Method, Buoyancy, Materials Testing and Properties, and

Conference Session

Education Ideas in Software Engineering

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Lonnie Welch; Karin Sandell; Chang Liu

-technical coworkers and clients throughin-depth discussions on software requirements, design, and implementation. Clearly,communication skills are an important skill set to software engineers. Yet computerscience undergraduate students, many of whom will become software engineers after theygraduate, receive little training in teamwork and communication skills, especially in thecontext of computer science coursework and projects. As a result, many computerscience students do not recognize the importance of communication and do not possesssatisfactory communication skills. For example, in Spring Quarter 2004, on ananonymous comment card collected from CS456/556, a software engineering courseoffered at Ohio University, one student complained that: “I

Conference Session

Emerging Trends in Engineering Education Poster Session

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

James Giles; Donald Roberts; David Mitchell; Anthony Richardson

Using Robotics Competitions to Teach Teamwork Principles And Fundamental Engineering/Computer Science Concepts James Giles, Anthony Richardson, Donald Roberts, David Mitchell University of EvansvilleAbstractAll freshmen in the electrical engineering, computer engineering, and computer scienceprograms at the University of Evansville take a common “Introduction to Engineering” courseduring their first semester. The course is focused on exposing students to team-based,multidiscipline, and project-oriented learning. Two robotics contests are used to teachfundamental principles in electrical engineering, computer engineering and computer science.The contests have also been very

Conference Session

ChE Department and Faculty Issues

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Gerri Burke; William Krantz; Joel Fried

: supplements to new or on-going NSF research grants; and, REUSite Grants based on a proposal to support a larger number of students on projects having a well-defined focus. NSF encourages REU Site programs to involve students from institutions whereresearch programs are limited. REU students must be either U.S. citizens or permanent residents.A significant number of the REU students should be from outside the host institution.An REU Site program typically involves participation of 10−15 students and is funded at a level Page 10.968.1of approximately $100,000 per year, usually for a period of three years. Renewal proposals from Proceedings

Conference Session

Innovation in Curriculum Development

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Susan Coleman; Hisham Alnajjar; Hesham Elsaghir; Alan Hadad; Donald Leone

Teaching Introduction to Geographic Information Systems, Including Laboratory Sessions, using a Combination of Distance Learning and Distance Teaching Techniques. Donald Leone, Alan Hadad, Susan Coleman Hisham Alnajjar, Hesham Elsaghir University of HartfordAbstract The primary objective of this project was to teach sophomore engineering students thefundamental concepts of geographic information systems (GIS), but with the teacher andstudents in different locations. Introduction to Geographic Information Systems is a 2 credit half semester course with 6contact hours including 3 hours of laboratory work

Conference Session

K-12 Poster Session

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Nathan Dees; Megan Perkey; Karen Davis; Nicholas Harth

Session 1510 STEPing into the Classroom: An Alternative Capstone Experience Karen C. Davis, Megan L. Perkey, Nicholas B. Harth, Nathan Dees Electrical & Computer Engineering and Computer Science Department University of Cincinnati Cincinnati, OH 45221-0030This paper describes the experiences of three Electrical Engineering seniors who chose analternative to a traditional capstone design project; they applied their undergraduateengineering education in high school math and science classrooms as NSF STEPFellows. Project STEP: Science and Technology Enhancement Program is sponsored bythe

Conference Session

Multidisciplinary Engineering Courses II

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Carol Hasenberg

and apply design skills to solve real problems while alsoconsidering the related societal, cultural, and historical dimensions. The objectives of the coursefrom the college’s perspective were to give students an overview of and experience in design anddesign professions, give students an opportunity to do hands-on design projects, encouragestudents interested in majoring in design-related professions, including engineering, usepedagogical techniques from engineering, and introduce non engineering students to anengineer’s way of understanding and creatively engaging with the world. With its emphasis oncritical thinking, communication, diversity, and ethical issues and social responsibility, Design &Society was envisioned as a means of

Conference Session

State of the Art in 1st-Year Programs

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Stephen Silliman; Leo McWilliams; Mark Gunty; Carrie Graf; Catherine Pieronek

have a loweroverall opinion of the first-semester engineering course. There was no statistical differencebetween group 2 and group 3 responses (at 5%) with respect to the evaluation of quality oflearning in the six aspects of the course.Two other areas where differences were observed between group 1 and the other two groups ofstudents related to student evaluation of the two projects completed in the first semester andstudent experience with respect to interacting with other students in the course. With respect tothe projects, the students are asked to rate the amount of learning, amount of effort, and interestlevel experienced in each of the projects using the following scale: 1 = Very high; 2 = High; 3 = Medium; 4

Conference Session

NSF Grantees Poster Session

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Lakshmi Munukutla, Arizona State University

. The MTF is located onthe ASU campus at Mesa, Arizona. The curriculum uses a modular design, and is competencybased, and industry validated with the goal of producing work ready graduates.The intent of this paper is to cover the underpinning philosophy of the module developmenteffort designed to maximize the effectiveness of the development and delivery of a laboratorycurriculum for Microelectronics. The paper describes the in depth process involved in this effortby taking one module as an example to illustrate the salient features of this approach. Inaddition, a distinctive delivery tool that is developed under this project will be discussed toexplain how remotely situated students in two-year institutions will get access to the materialprior

Conference Session

Industrial Collaborations

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Todd Dunn

reliableand accurate schedule updates using popular application software (Primavera Systems Inc.).Detailed ‘means and methods’ employed when updating schedules are described. In particular,the paper describes the software settings and approaches for configuring the settings in an effortto achieve accurate, reliable schedule updates.Introduction:Creating CPM (Critical Path Method) schedules for construction projects is commonplace.Construction schedules include a group of activities which must be performed in order tocomplete, say, a new building. Every activity in a construction schedule has an estimated timeduration to complete the activity. Examples of activities might include, ‘Erect Structural Steel’(with, for example, a ten day duration) or

Conference Session

NSF Grantees Poster Session

Collection

2005 Annual Conference

Authors

Don Millard

Session 1526 Impacting the Future by Leveraging the Past Don Lewis Millard, Ph.D. RensselaerAbstractThe paper presents an overview of a pilot project that utilizes the rich historical archives ofGeneral Electric’s (GE) science & technology to augment the production of new educationalmaterials; including a wonderful series of 23 scientific comic books that GE produced between1946 and 1959. The paper discusses how images of physical artifacts and historical documentshave been integrated with the comics and other archival pieces to produce interactive

Collection

2005 ASEE Midwest Section Conference

Authors

W. R. Penney; G. J. Thoma; R. R. Beitle

one another in solving real environmental problems. Typical projects include thethinning of forests to minimize the potential for fire damage, the prevention of foodborneillnesses due to bacterial contamination of tomatoes, and the design of a mobile treatmentfacility to treat mixed transuranic wastes. The students must select the “best” technologyfrom a number of alternatives, run the necessary experiments to prove the concept,construct a scale model of their design, prepare a market analysis and business plan whileaddressing community relations and environmental regulations, and make oral and posterpresentations at the competition. This paper compares and contrasts the WERCexperience with the traditional classroom capstone design experience.