Conference Session

Electrical and Computer Engineering Laboratories

Collection

2011 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Nael Barakat, Grand Valley State University; Lihong (Heidi) Jiao, Grand Valley State University

Tagged Divisions

Division Experimentation & Lab-Oriented Studies

course. The course is an activity within abigger plan to develop undergraduate educational modules, and outreach activities, innanotechnology. The lab activities covered multiple aspects of nanotechnology to expose thestudents to as many parts as possible of the spectrum of nanotechnology. This was by-design toprovide the students with a practical background that will enable them to have more choices,should they decide to pursue a career in nanotechnology.Lab activities were assessed directly and indirectly to improve the following offering ofactivities. Achievements by students differed depending on the level of difficulty of the labtopic, but most students managed to grasp the material very well.In the next offering, an attempt will be made to

Conference Session

NSF Grantees Poster Session

Collection

2011 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Donald Plumlee, Boise State University

Tagged Topics

NSF Grantees

careers should be agoal of project-based education, but may also be a hurdle towards effective teaching. In thisstudy, a group of engineering students were surveyed using a modified version of the “Need forCognition” study to evaluate engineering student attitudes towards using cognitive tools.[5] Theresults of this survey are presented in this paper along with several conclusions regarding theeffect of project-based curriculum on student attitudes. Page 22.234.2II. Class DescriptionThis study involves the investigation of a senior level mechanical engineering class ofapproximately 38 students. The students were not identified demographically, but

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Phillip J. Cornwell; Jerry M. Fine

is on the quarter system.One overall purpose of the SEC is to enhance the students' problem solving abilities. We believethat the incoming students have some misconceptions about the problem solving process thatneed to be corrected before they can progress to the more difficult problems that they will facelater in their undergraduate careers. These misconceptions include the ideas that "solvingproblems means finding a formula to apply" and "I can demonstrate my cleverness by solvingproblems while showing as little of the actual work as possible." To cause the students to changesome of their notions of problem solving, we require a far more formalized and completeapproach to problem solving than they have yet experienced.In the first course

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Tom Ward; Elizabeth Alford

addressing key personal and socialchallenges that students face as they enter college. These include orientation to the libraryresources, career services, health awareness, and managing personal freedom and choices. Thesetopics are discussed within the context of being a student in the engineering community.A second portion of the class introduces students to the engineering profession and thepreparation necessary to become an engineer. Students are introduced to the engineering designprocess, team-based learning and basic computational tools. Students work in teams on anassigned design project and present it to the class accompanied by a written report. The team

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

James Pearson

other students was unfair because thestudents were not allowed to learn as effectively as (they would) if they were to work ontheir own." This is exactly the environment they need to experience. Non-cooperativebehavior, contradistinctory ideas, compromise, schedule delays, working together tomeet deadlines and subjective evaluations are all desirable factors for these students toexperience before they enter the senior capstone course and ultimately their careers. Page 4.80.6IX. ConclusionsThis laboratory experience develops team work, stimulates laboratory activity andprovides for a meaningful design experience. All the objectives outlined for this

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Takayuki Sugita

and Intentionhave sufficient typing skills tend to adovocate CAD.Because the number of students who prefer traditional drafting is 62 and the number of studentswith CAD preference is 179, 117 out of 188 students, namely 62% who initially disliked the tradi-tional drafting turned out to adovocate CAD. This is a remarkable effect due to CAD practice.No.11 of Fig.1 shows 15% of the students (36 out of 250) hope to continue CAD practice tobecome specialists in the future. Thus, CAD practice has given them an enlightening effect fortheir future career.6.Working timeNo.12 of Fig.1 shows students' feeling about the length of working time as in item 12 on Table 2.Total working time was 12 hours. It is shown that 36% of the students feel it was short

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Ann M. Bisantz; Amjad Aref; Alexander N. Cartwright

an Assistant Professor of Industrial Engineering at the State University of New York at Buffalo. Shereceived her Ph.D. in Industrial and Systems Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology in 1997 the areaof Human-Machine Systems, and B.S. and M.S. degrees in Industrial Engineering from SUNY at Buffalo. Dr.Bisantz pursues research and teaching in the areas of human factors, cognitive engineering, and human decisionmaking.ALEXANDER N. CARTWRIGHTAlexander N. Cartwright received his Ph.D. from the University of Iowa in 1995 and has been an AssistantProfessor at the State University of New York at Buffalo since August 1995. In 1998, he was fortunate enough toreceive a NSF CAREER Award that supports his research and educational

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Robert P. Hesketh; Stephanie Farrell; C. Stewart Slater

using Page 4.19.1engineering measurements as a common thread. The theme of the second semester is the reverseengineering of a commercial product or process. Previous reverse engineering projects haveinvolved products such as automatic coffee makers [3, 4, 5], hair dryers and electric toothbrushes[6]. This paper describes our first effort to incorporate the design and reverse engineering of aprocess into our Freshman Clinic. We focus on the investigation of the beer production process.A project introduced in a three-week program sponsored by the National Science Foundation in1990 was the inspiration for this project. The program, Exploring Career

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

George Stephanopoulos; Alan S. Foss

and the several otherquestions posed at the outset of this paper. With those questions resolved, the engineering problemis considered solved. However, the pedagogical ÀloopÀ about modeling still has to be closed. We must eventually Page 4.362.6challenge students to write the equations. Otherwise, the students are left without confirmation andconfidence that they can execute an analysis and a mathematical model of the process, a capabilitythey will need in their career as an engineer. We describe equation-writing sessions in the nextsection. In working with a small group of students, we have found that they enthusiastically wantedto

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Neda Fabris

, to groupsof internal and external “customers” with no or little engineering background. This presentconsiderable difficulty to many engineering students who choose engineering careers becausethey were “good in math and science”, but not in written and oral skills, or who were too “shy”to argue their point of view in front of others. Also, engineering in its international universalbackground was a “refuge” for new emigrants, or people with English as a second languagegiving them the opportunity to excel despite the hurdle of mastering a new language.The new engineering paradigm and industry requirement to “hit the ground running” placesspecial emphasis on engineering education to provide graduating engineers with the experienceand practice in

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Andrew Grossfield

changing is the nuts and bolts ofmathematics. But the repetitive mechanics of form changing should not be substituted at theexpense of the strategies in advanced mathematics classes.References:1. Grossfield, Andrew “On the Intrinsic Structure of Calculus” Proceedings of the 1995 ASEE AnnualConference, Session 1265 (311-315)2. Grossfield, Andrew “On the Classification of Functions and Curve Plotting” Proceedings of the 1990 ASEEAnnual Conference, Session 2665 (1782-1784)3. Grossfield, Andrew “What are Differential Equations? A review of Curve Families” Proceedings of the 1997ASEE Annual Conference, Session 2665ANDREW GROSSFIELDThroughout his career Dr. Grossfield, has combined an interest in engineering design and mathematics. He earneda BSEE at

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Patricia Click

convincingly justified” (Kurfiss 1988). Study after study has shown thatundergraduate students are seriously deficient in their ability to think critically (Belenky et al.1986; Bloom 1987; Keeley et al. 1982; King et al.1983). Although senior engineering studentsare better able to marshal evidence than entering students, many still believe that judgment is amatter of “individual idiosyncracies” rather than the critical evaluation of different points ofview (Welfel 1982).Students preparing for careers in science or engineering need to learn how “to draw soundinferences from observations, critically analyze and evaluate previous research, and generatenew questions or experiments” (Kurfiss 1988). A course that focuses on various cultural

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Eric W. Tisdale

Conference Proceedings,ASEE, 19974) Conversations with Joe Koenig, CEO of Interactive Image Technologies Ltd., jkoenig@interactiv.com5) Grambo, A., Central Nine Career Center, Indianapolis, Indiana.6) Stepper Motor Applications Across Electrical Engineering Technology Curriculum, Grinberg, Barker, Goldberg,Matusiak, ASEE Annual Conference Proceedings, ASEE, 19977) Using Automated Instrumentation and Available Software to Provide Interactive Laboratory Instruction toDistance Education Students on the Internet, Dutcher, Raza, Rippy, Yi, Hess, ASEE Annual ConferenceProceedings, ASEE, 19978) Pcanywhere controls remote computers.9) CuSeeMe permits voice and video.10) Phonefree.com permits voice only.11) ICQ.com limits connections to those only on your

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

R. J. Helgeson; Troy Henson

. inelectrical engineering, and has research interests in engineering education and energy dissipation systems.TROY F. HENSON, Ph.D., P.E.. Dr. Henson is dean and professor of engineering at UT Martin. Prior to joiningUT Martin in 1994, Henson’s career included 18 years with IBM Corporation in Huntsville, Alabama, and Houston,Texas; five years on the faculty at Louisiana Tech University; and seven years as a part-time member of the facultyat Rice University. He received his B.S. and M.S. degrees from the University of Arkansas and his Ph.D. from theUniversity of Texas at Austin, all in electrical engineering. Page 4.31.10

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Loren Lutes; James T. P. Yao

significantly more than in the alternativeresembling the current master’s degree. Again, there are many ramifications, including methodsof financing and societal acceptance of this model as an attractive career path, particularly forstudents from families with low to moderate income.A key question in all of these considerations seems to be the needs of the civil engineeringemployer. It is well known that many civil engineering employers now require a master’s degreefor entry level employees in some specialties. In fact, this has been used as one of the argumentsfor moving to a requirement that this be true for all civil engineers. On the other hand, amajority of current civil engineers do now find employment armed only with a BS degree. It isunclear

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Erol Inelmen

research can help students develop this ability, excessive costs are incurredwhen research is used as a tool for teaching. While providing the basic knowledge good teachersshould stimulate the minds of their students in the direction of “critical thinking” and“creativity”. Research activities, vital for raising funds and building public image that will attractbetter students, should not hinder the efficiency of teaching activities 6.III. First Experience Gained in IntegrationWhile investigating the possibilities integrating the engineering education curriculum assuggested in the previous section, the author was for the first time in his career asked to give acourse in Automatic Control. An adequate textbook was searched that could to be used

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Bill Diong

prepare them better for a rewarding engineering career. To achieve this, a proposal was recently submitted by the author and 2 other facultymembers to the National Science Foundation’s Instrumentation and Laboratory ImprovementProgram for the establishment of a state-of-the-art Dynamic Systems and Controls instructionallaboratory at UTPA. The proposal was funded and this laboratory is now being developed for use(to varying degrees) by all Electrical, Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering undergraduatestudents at UTPA. Its main goals are to:a. prepare students to be multidisciplinary in their thinkingb. introduce students to a model-based simulation-oriented approach to control systems designand developmentc. let students gain experience

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Ann D. Christy; Marybeth Lima

customers’ requirements. Direct interaction with the customergives engineering students a more realistic experience of design, and better preparation for theirprofessional careers. However, as Christianson and Rohrbach1 point out, the customers’consideration may be subtle and may require ongoing dialogue and questioning between thestudent designers and the client/customer. Industry has been critical of engineering educationthat does not produce graduates who are sufficiently knowledgeable about how design ispracticed in industry or who are able to deal with open-ended problems.8 Interacting with realclients is a good way to enhance ties between industry and academia. Another method toenhance industrial ties is the use of student portfolios.2, 5Much

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Richard B Cole; Charles V. Schaefer; Bernard Gallois; Keith Sheppard

a faculty advisor for the firstthree semesters until they started their chosen disciplinary elective sequence, at which point theytransitioned to an advisor in their chosen engineering Department. The general experience wasthat little interaction took place between students and advisors in the first three semesters. In theseminar, the faculty gets to know a small group of students over a full semester and this pro-motes much freer and extensive interaction in an advisory mode, both within class and outsideone on one.References1. Landis, Raymond B., Studying Engineering - A Road Map to a Rewarding Career , Discovery Press, Burbank, CA, 236 pp., 1995

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Jawa Mariappan; Anthony J. Marchese; James A. Newell; John L. Schmalzel; Beena Sukumaran; Ravi Ramachandran

ExperimentSophomore Engineering Clinic IHaving studied in detail the work of practicing engineering designers, the students are ready toembark on their careers as designers. To meet this objective, in the Sophomore EngineeringClinic I, all engineering students complete four compact, open-ended design projects sponsoredby each of the four departments. Each module demonstrates the design principles inherent invarious classes of design problems. As outlined in table 2, during the course of the semestereach student completes the following modules: design of a product, design of a process, designof a structure, and design of a simulation. In the Fall 1998 semester, sophomore engineeringstudents from each of the four departments completed the following four 3-week

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Barry Jackson

and process.The ProblemArchitects and engineers, who need to interact during their professional career in order to buildany kind of complex building, are educated entirely separately. “Over the past century, increasedmovement toward concentration within an academic discipline has taken charge of the curricu-lum, as well as serving to compartmentalize the professoriate and the institution.” 1 The verticalseparation of disciplines occurs in most universities. This suggests a need for modification of thecurriculum, the delivery of course material and teaching methods. Fortunately, this comes duringa period of reflection in schools of architecture when, as Mitgang suggests, there are “growingdoubts over whether the traditional educational

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Sohail Anwar; Shamsa S. Anwar

an established length and/or scope in a recognized occupational skill category.Apprenticeship is a work-study training scheme in which part of the training occurs on the joband part occurs off the job in a classroom or workshop setting. (Glover, 1986, p. 5) Page 4.560.3Apprenticeship training is particularly useful for occupations requiring diverse skills andknowledge, as well as maturity and independence of judgment. The number and scope of theseoccupations have expanded dramatically in recent years to include such fields as business andhealth careers (U. S. DOL, 1989).Apprenticeships permit employers to train employees to industry-based and

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

S. A. Chickamenahalli; M. Bolepalli; Venkateswaran Nallaperumal; Chih-Ping Yeh; Bonnie Shelnut

. Page 4.118.4 5. Conclusion Our experiences of developing an electric machines course for a NSF-funded Greenfield Coalition for new Manufacturing Education is provided. Significant features of the development are described. The intention of providing the detail of our experience was to set some of the “Do’s” and “Don’ts” for such developments. The effectiveness of the courseware as enhanced by utilizing multimedia components is highlighted. It appears that serious learning of technical material, which normally occurs only once in a student’s learning career, has to be carefully kept in mind in order to prevent CBI courseware comparison to video games. However, providing effective interactions on each screen of the technical material appears to

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Raji Sundarajaran; Christina Sisterna; Charles A. Lipari; Robert W. Nowlin

respectively. In 1989 he received the Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Louisiana State Universityin Baton Rouge. He worked as a digital systems engineer for Texas Instruments from 1978 to 1984, where he waspart of a design team developing array processor technology for seismic signal processing. Before returning to anacademic career he worked for Thermalscan Inc., where he was chief engineer for the development of a pavementimage processing system for surveying distress in road beds. In 1990, he joined Arizona State University, where heis now assistant professor in the Department of Electronic and Computer Engineering Technology. He is currentlyworking on projects to develop an image processing system for the recognition of breast cancer using

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Edward Gehringer

time on course preparation, faculty and students will be able to spend more timeworking with each other, to the benefit of both.AcknowledgmentsThe assistance of the following NCSU students with this project is gratefully acknowledged: Xiaokang Sang, AnaGoulart, Chenhao Geng, Zhiling Zheng, Sonali Aditya, and David Steffy.Bibliography1. Gehringer, Edward F., "A database of course materials in computer architecture," Proceedings of the FirstWorkshop on Undergraduate Computer Architecture Education, Santa Margherita Ligure Italy, 19 June 1995.Available on the Web at http://www4.ncsu.edu/eos/users/e/efg/archdb/public/full-paper.html.2. Lozada, Marlene, "Look out for distance learning," Techniques: Making Education and Career Connections72:7

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Justin Pniower; Michael Ruane; Bennett Goldberg; Selim Unlu

Francis Bitter National Magnet Lab at MIT. He holds two patents, and is author of over 60 scientificpublications.SELIM ÜNLÜ is Associate Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering. He received his BSEE from MiddleEast Technical University, Ankara, Turkey and his MSEE and Ph.D. in EE from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. He has received a Research Initiation Award and a CAREER Award from NSF, and a YoungInvestigator Award from ONR. Page 4.597.9

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Steven L. Cohen; Dennis P. Slevin; David I. Cleland; Kim LaScola Needy; Heather Nachtmann

ProjectManagement, Engineering Management and Manufacturing Management. An active member of the ProjectManagement Institute (PMI), he has published numerous articles, handbook chapters, and papers at professionalmeetings in his field. He has received funding for eighteen research projects during his academic career, and hasgiven over 300 lectures and seminars outside of his university. He has served as a consultant for both national andforeign companies, and is recognized as one of the best known members of PMI. He has been described as the“Father” of Project Management. He has both a national and international reputation in his field, and has beenhonored for his original and continuing contribution to his disciplines.DENNIS P. SLEVINDennis P. Slevin is

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

George W. Garrison; Garry D. Coleman

advantages and disadvantages of each approach are described.The two approaches are compared and recommendations for others implementing web-assistedinstruction are presented.I. IntroductionDistance learning is extremely popular with the full-time employed engineer1. It makesobtaining a graduate degree possible without sacrificing one's current career. The functionalityof the world wide web (www) and increased access to it have made this tool a necessity, ratherthan an optional part of delivering distance education. This paper describes and compares theauthors' experience as the www has become an increasing part of how they deliver courses.While the courses are primarily delivered via live and recorded video, the instructors rely heavilyon the www to

Collection

1999 Annual Conference

Authors

Alexander N. Cartwright

Functional Groups: The Influence of Group Size, AcademicRecord, Practical Experience, and Learning Style,” Journal of Engineering Education, vol. 86, no. 4, 1997, pp. 321-332.13. Chrysanthe Demetry and James E. Groccia, “A Comparative Assessment of Students’ Experiences in TwoInstructional Formats of an Introductory Materials Science Course,” Journal of Engineering Education, vol. 86, no.3, 1997, pp. 203-210.ALEXANDER N. CARTWRIGHT: Alexander N. Cartwright received his Ph.D. from the University of Iowa in1995 and has been an Assistant Professor at the State University of New York at Buffalo since August 1995. In1998, he was fortunate enough to receive a NSF CAREER Award that supports his research and educationalactivities. He is active in curriculum

Collection

2000 Annual Conference

Authors

J. Arvid Andersen

educators must constantly look at interestingtrends that may illustrate where engineering careers are going. The new ABET 2000 elevenpoint program should be observed with great interest. In my opinion this program certainlytry to create a competent graduate ready to perform work immediately. We must try to predictwhat knowledge and base skills is needed by the new graduates if they have to make thetransition from college to work smoothly and perform successfully2. One way to prepare fortomorrow is to have a thorough understanding of to day.The futureThe Danish society develops towards a more and more service oriented society. Themanufacturing industry will be highly automated with increasing use of robotics. Ourengineers should therefore have a