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2005 GSW

Authors

Pete Hylton

entitledManaging Technical Risk,1 when he said “ The risks associated with science basedcommercial innovations are real and often hard to quantify and circumscribe. These risks Proceedings of the 2005 ASEE Gulf-Southwest Annual conference Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Copyright © 2005, American Society for Engineering Educationcontribute to business failures, but more importantly to underinvestment in the earlystages of research and to opportunities foregone.” Although it is generally the high-techindustries that have begun to implement TRM processes, the benefits should beapplicable to any industry, regardless of level of technology. Early identification,assessment, and mitigation of

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Paul R. Corder

, engineering science, and engineeringprinciples. Undergraduate university education attempts to provide the exposure to andexperience with these tools to provide a reasonably rounded person capable of beingproductive in society. This educational process provides a framework to which thestudent can add additional capabilities or skills to enhance his/her own engineeringsuccess potential. All undergraduate mechanical engineering students at Lamar University takeMEEN 3320, Mechanical Design I and MEEN 4323, Mechanical Design II. Themechanical design texts introduce the Design Process in their first chapter in a variety ofways. The Design Process can be summarized as follows: 1) Recognition of Societal Need

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2005 GSW

Authors

Nripendra N Sarker; Mohan Ketkar

likely that a student makes a numerical score closer to 100 in one measure and nottoo well in the other measure. Making good scores in all measures gives comfort to the students.However, doing not so well in a measure may be the reasons to lose confidence in improving inother measures to still make a better grade in the course. Multiple measures in a course makethis problem more complicated for the students.Until now there is no known software available for students to monitor their own progress duringa semester. Microsoft Excel allows developing efficient utility programs as needed. Sarker andKetkar 1 described a detailed method of developing EXCEL spreadsheet to process raw gradesfrom various measures in a class. They also showed how to

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Mythili Vajjalla; Kashinath Kumar; Enno “Ed” Koehn

may be rubble such as concrete, bricks and asphalt, wood and woodproducts, plaster, metals, plastics, and insulation. These materials commonly referred toas Construction and Demolition (C&D) debris comprise approximately 15 to 30 percentof all waste disposed of in landfills. In addition, purchasing decisions associated with theconstruction projects can affect the amounts of waste generated, as well future energyrequirements 1.Air quality: Construction projects can have a significant impact on indoor environmentalquality (IEQ) through the introduction of pollutants such as particulates, offensive odors,toxic chemical vapors, microbial, and combustion products5. The quality of air maydeteriorate, in part, due to the dusts and odors produced

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2005 GSW

Authors

Monty Smith; Mitty Plummer; Leticia H. Anaya

assemble in stands8:15 a Commencement for Year 2004 !8:30 a – 12:00 a DC BEST Tournament begins12:00 a – 12:45 p LUNCH on your own (approximate time)12:45 p – 1:00 p Halftime Report1:00 p – 4:00 p DC BEST matches in simultaneous games, continued4:00 p DC BEST Championships4:15 p Awards Ceremony5:00p 2004 DC BEST Championship concludes. All teams remove their banners ALL TEAMS RETURN PARTS ISSUED!Fig. 1. 2004 DC BEST Game Day Schedule Proceedings of the 2005 ASEE Gulf-Southwest Annual Conference Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Copyright

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Mohan Ketkar

for their team’s role in the case study.Thus, these working students became a valuable resource to other students in the team andenriched the learning process as a whole. The participating students filled a questionnaire.Preliminary analysis of the students’ response supported above conclusion. IntroductionIn the US Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) 1 evaluates the quality,content, and success of the undergraduate engineering and engineering technology programs.Two commissions within ABET are called the Engineering Accreditation Commission (EAC)and the Technology Accreditation Commission (TAC) for Engineering programs andTechnology programs respectively. As a coordinator of the

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2005 GSW

Authors

Mirley K. Balasubramanya; George D. Tintera; Alexey Sadovski

passed into the participant’s hand wastaken as a measure of their reaction time. The students readily made a qualitativeobservation that the farther the rule fell, the slower the reaction time. When challengedthey admitted that the measurement was not really time, so it was hard to measure howmuch faster one person was than another.Connecting time to distance where an object moves by gravity alone is easily done bymeans of the formula y = (1/2) g t2, where t is the elapsed time, y is the distance fallenand g is the gravitational constant (9.8 m/s2 = 980 cm/s2). The students were eager tofind their reaction times made ready use of the model to do so.Once the students had determined their reaction times in terms of seconds, they were ableto relate

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Mary Mary; Emee Ermel

Conference Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Copyright © 2003, American Society for Engineering EducationIn UT’s College of Engineering, several professors had used a software package developed in themid-1980s to familiarize students in an undergraduate fluid behavior course with PVTmeasurements. While the old simulation (see Figure 1) was powerful and filled a vitalcurriculum need, the user interface was dated and very difficult to use. All actions wereaccomplished using function keys, and students had to manually record the data collected. Figure 1: Old PVT SimulationAlthough the old simulation’s effectiveness was questionable, research and emerging trends

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

M.K. Balasubramanya

Session T3D3 Engineering ethics as part of the core course in professional ethics M.K. Balasubramanya Department of Physical and Life Sciences College of Science and Technology Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi AbstractProfessional ethics is taught as a required general education (core) course in manyundergraduate programs. We describe a model for collaborative teaching of professionalethics by a team that consists of (1) philosophers and (2) science and technologyprofessionals. The model requires the

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

M. M. Darwish; M. H. Akram; B. L. Green

any program hinges on keeping interest alive in all participants. Surely, forstudents, the biggest incentives are to learn and improve their grades in the course.Students from three disciplines took part in the preliminary phase of this research: (1)electrical engineering technology, (2) mechanical engineering technology, and (3)construction engineering technology.On a volunteer-basis, students from Group I were teamed with 2 to 3 students from GroupIII or Group IV. The students from Group I were appointed as a team leader with the taskof organizing extra coaching session for their team members, minimum of 2 hours perweek. The incentives for the participants are that leaders will get a bonus of 2.5% towardstheir final grade and-team members

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2005 GSW

Authors

M. M. Darwish; M. H. Akram; B. Green

Doing the Real Thing Figure 1. Cone of learning Case Study ApproachThere are number of definitions for the term “case study”. Case studies are actualexamples requiring the synthesis of a large amount of different kind of information, andthe making of recommendations or decisions. Yin, (1994) defines case study as “A casestudy is an empirical inquiry that investigates a significant event within its real worldenvironment, the boundaries between event and environment are not clear, and in whichmultiple evidence are used. Fry et al., (1999) describes case studies as complex exampleswhich give an insight into the context of a problem as well as illustrating the main point.Research on the web can yield

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2005 GSW

Authors

Luciana R. Barroso; Jim Morgan

is expected to improve students’ understanding,motivation and creativity. The projects in this course are all centered on different realistic civilengineering systems, with loading specified according to ASCE 7 Minimum Design Loads forBuildings and Other Structures3. These projects have several objectives: (1) to allow students totackle larger and more realistic civil engineering analysis problems, (2) expose students tocomputer software packages available for structural analysis, (3) evaluate critical thinking andcommunication skills. The projects are designed to be solved by student teams, who are toldthey are acting as consultants on the project posed. The students are presented with a scenario(building location and function) and a

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Kevin M. Nickels

Copyright  2005, American Society for Engineering EducationLaboratory. In these courses, the students are prepared for the electrical engineering portion ofany disciplinary electives they desire. These electives are taken in the junior or senior year, andare typically offerred every other year. In this environment, one course in Digital Logic Design(DLD) is offered, along with a supporting laboratory course. This contrasts to a traditionalelectrical or computer engineering program, where this same topical coverage would be handledin more depth in two or even three semesters.Electrical engineering electives are shown below in Table 1. Other than Applied Signals &Systems, no elective course requires other electives as prerequisites. Therefore

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Kenneth Van Treuren

assessment processes in place. ME LAB OrganizationME Lab is a three credit hour course taught as one hour of lecture and six hours oflaboratory. Its course description is: “Measurement of fluid flow, heat transfer, power, and other properties of mechanical equipment. Design of experiments, selection and use of data acquisition systems, data reporting, and presentation.”7Course objectives state8: 1. Learn the important tools and concepts associated with work in a mechanical laboratory including; experimental methods and techniques, data-analysis techniques, engineering measurement systems, and test equipment/facilities. 2. Learn how to plan and conduct an experiment 3. Learn how to

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Kambiz Farahmand; Kai Jin

utilizing Black Board and WebCT. The program started with facultytraveling over the weekend to one of the plants centrally located and lecturing Fridaysand Saturdays. To meet the goals set by the assessment committee, a set of features wereset forth for the curriculum development2,3. The main objective was to have a programthat provides a sound technical knowledge and solid background in the following areas: 1. Mathematics 2. Computer information systems 3. Computer Aided Design in Industrial Engineering 4. Computer Aided Design in Electrical Engineering 5. Manufacturing process, quality control, and safety 6. Economic awareness and management science 7. Research project in a major area

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Jose Amieva; Apolinar Zapata

–point toundergraduate mathematics 1. Unfortunately, in some Universities, more than half of thestudents fail the introductory course in calculus. One of the problems encountered inteaching calculus identified at the Tulane Conference was “students performing symbolicmanipulations with little understanding or ability to use calculus in subsequent courses”.Another cause identified was “mathematics lagging behind other disciplines in the use oftechnology.” 2,4Over the past decade, considerable resources have been devoted nation-wide to assessingand reformulating the teaching of calculus in the first year university curriculum 5. Thisreformulating movement is called “calculus reform.” Now is the time to do for math whatwe have done for reading

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Jorge E. Navarro; Apolinar Zapata

ofincluding active-based exercises in their courses, even if it is with little frequency or withlimited resources. It is also recommend to find real-world evidence of the uses of calculusin the community and then build into the curriculum a set of “case of studies” as evidenceof calculus at work. Activity 1: Volume of a Plastic GlassAbstractIn this activity, students will demonstrate their knowledge of the calculation of volumesof a solid of revolution.PrerequisitesStudents should be: 9 Able to take measurements in centimeters. 9 Able to find the radius of a circle given its circumference. 9 Able to graph the points of height vs. radius (scatter diagram), using the TI-83 calculator. 9 Able to find the function of

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

John D. Fernandez

systems with an interactive component. Therefore, a user-centered development methodology like human-computer interaction (HCI) is a much needed disciplinewithin all computer science programs. This discipline is the basis for an engaging mindset. HCI is an interdisciplinary methodology that involves skills from disciplines such aspsychology/cognitive science, engineering, informatics, computer science/software engineering,ergonomics, human factors, and social sciences4. Therefore, HCI is more closely aligned with user-centered development. Alan Cooper relates his experience of the broader perspective which he couldonly see after he extricated himself from the “programming grip”1. He claims that only then did he seethat programming is such a

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

John D. Fernandez

program and the results that have been achieved so far. Background Facts“By avoiding computers, women [and minorities] may be missing out on the generoussalaries and abundant career opportunities in information technology.”1 Texas A&MUniversity – Corpus Christi (A&M-CC) in partnership with the Nation ScienceFoundation (NSF) and Texas Engineering and Technical Consortium (TETC) is trying tocombat the shortage of women and minorities in computer science. This shortage is seennationwide, and in 2001, 3.4 percent of all conferred undergraduate degrees were Proceedings of the 2005 ASEE Gulf-Southwest Annual Conference Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Jim Farison

only the traditional “lecture” format (with 43 fifty-minute sessions per semester).Nonetheless, it seemed best for the course, both for appeal and pedagogy, to have a non-trivial“imaging systems” component as well as the “image processing” component.The textbook selected for the course was Digital Image Processing (Second Edition), 2002, byRafael C. Gonzalez and Richard E. Woods, published by Prentice Hall. It has a number of desirablefeatures, with good on-line help. While it has less directly on imaging systems than desired for thiscourse, it does have quite a strong first chapter that reflects actual imaging applications by theirspectral range of operation. The course was formed around the following textbook chapter outlineand order: 1

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2005 GSW

Authors

Jignesh Rathod; Farouk G. Attia

theAmerican Society of Quality (ASQ). In September 1994, QS 9000 officially replaced allpreviously existing multiple quality system manuals and programs and was alsosimultaneously adopted by the truck manufacturers as their supplier quality systemprogram. QS 9000 requirements applied to all internal and external suppliers of rawmaterials, components, subassemblies and service parts. Characteristics of the QS 9000 SpecificationsThe underlying principles for QS 9000 come from ISO 9001: 1994 standard. QS 9000 isstructured into three sections. Section 1, Core Requirements, consists of twenty elements,reproduced verbatim, in Italics, from ISO 9001: 1994 Section 4. Additional comments,modifications or interpretations to these elements, to

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Jessica M. Dick

program and the results that have been achieved so far. Background Facts“By avoiding computers, women [and minorities] may be missing out on the generoussalaries and abundant career opportunities in information technology.”1 Texas A&MUniversity – Corpus Christi (A&M-CC) in partnership with the Nation ScienceFoundation (NSF) and Texas Engineering and Technical Consortium (TETC) is trying tocombat the shortage of women and minorities in computer science. This shortage is seennationwide, and in 2001, 3.4 percent of all conferred undergraduate degrees were Proceedings of the 2005 ASEE Gulf-Southwest Annual Conference Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Jeffrey Froyd; Donald A. Maxwell

, motivate them to stay in engineering. The seven issues arerelated to two key areas, projects and relationships between engineering and mathematics andscience classes.Issues related to projects are: 1). Students and faculty members perceive projects currently being used in first-year engineering courses as “build and see” where students proceed through trial and error with little connectivity with the sciences or mathematics [3,4]. Some programs have provided simulation tools to enable students to predict the performance of their design proposal [5,6]. 2). Engineering faculty members thought that success of a project relied more on the fabrication skill as opposed to application of the engineering design

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

James R. Morgan; Brian P. Janak

. Proceedings of the 2005 ASEE Gulf-Southwest Annual Conference Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Copyright  2005, American Society for Engineering Education Development MethodologyThe research aims to develop a web-based model, which systematically shows animated 3-dimensional construction sequence of a framed steel structure. Hot links are embedded within thevirtual 3D model of the framed steel structure at the steel joints to pop-up VRML navigationwindows for real-time views of steel joints. The steps listed below are followed for the study andcreation of the model. A flow chart for the sequence of steps is shown in Fig.1

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

James E. Cross

addressable DIP switches whichprovide a simple way to communicate with the board. The LEDs are given labels from 0 to 3 andthe switches are given labels from 0 to 3. Connect the power supply to the DSK and use the USBcable to connect the DSK to the host computer. As a self-test, when the power is connected, the4 LEDs will blink 3 times and then stay on. In addition, a 1 kHz signal will sound through thespeakers for about a second. The DSK is functioning OK if it passes this test.Launch Code Composer Studio by double clicking on the CCS icon. Note that the power shouldbe on to the DSK and the USB cable connected when CCS is launched. If it is not connected, amessage will appear stating that it was not possible to initialize the DSK. The 4 LEDs will

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

J. M. Duff

unilaterally. Forexample, the United State Patent Office 1 must work closely with such organizations asthe World Intellectual Property Organization (WIPO) 2 to assure that intellectual propertyrights are protected worldwide.Issues of intellectual property are generally dealt with in situ within engineering andtechnology curricula. That is, issues of patents and copyrights are discussed as part ofother topics, such as design, manufacturing, capstone projects, or entrepreneurialactivities. There has been no coordinated curricular effort in this area and accreditationagencies have not been specific in either the value they place on the topic or how IPunderstanding might be evaluated as a desirable outcome. Charles Garris proposed thatintellectual

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Sami Tannous

helping students learn the subject at hand, JiTT can also bringbenefits by helping students structure their time and the way they approach a newsubject. Most instructors agree that students get more in classroom if they preparefor class by reading the text ahead of the lecture2. It also helps students to developand practice writing skills. JiTT promotes construction classes’ instruction as adialogue whether as student-student or student-teacher.Assignments are posted on the web which students access and respond to via theweb before class time. Some samples of questions given to the students include: 1. Regardless of the type of specs used, there are instances when the contractor will be perplexed. For example “Install shoring in all trenches

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Robert Seaker; Farouk G. Attia

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Pradeep Bhattacharya; Nikhil Modi; Fred Lacy

CAVE can be thought of as an extensionof this philosophy. Besides providing a highly coordinated walk-in virtual environment,the CAVE also allows for interaction between a user and the computers that operate it, allin real time. A menu-driven computer program employed in the CAVE is much morethan a tutorial; it is an experience. Proceedings of the 2005 ASEE Gulf-Southwest Annual Conference Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi Copyright © 2005, American Society for Engineering EducationFigure 1. The CAVE, visualization equipment, and a user interacting with data inside therunning CAVE. Contents of the ProgramThe Virtual Silicon Environment (VISIEN

Collection

2005 GSW

Authors

Larry L. White