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Lessons Learned from a First-Year Engineering Wind Turbine Project

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Conference

2021 ASEE North Central Section Conference

Location

University of Toledo, Ohio

Publication Date

March 19, 2021

Start Date

March 19, 2021

End Date

March 20, 2021

Tagged Topic

Diversity

Page Count

2

DOI

10.18260/1-2--36347

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/36347

Download Count

167

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Paper Authors

biography

Todd France Ohio Northern University

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Todd France is the director of Ohio Northern University's Engineering Education program, which strives to prepare engineering educators for grades 7-12. Dr. France also helps coordinate the first-year engineering experience at ONU. He earned his PhD from the University of Colorado Boulder in Architectural Engineering, and conducted research in K-12 engineering education and project-based learning.

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biography

William Sierzputowski Ohio Northern University

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A senior Engineering Education student at Ohio Northern University, Will participates in robotics, is the past president of his school's ASEE chapter, and is a member of Tau Beta Pi, IEEE and ACM. His engineering interests lie mainly in the fields of electrical and computer engineering. Upon graduation, he hopes to begin teaching engineering to high school students and to serve as both a role model and advocate for pursuing STEM, and specifically engineering as a field of study and career.

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Abstract

A first-year interdisciplinary engineering program at a small, private institution emphasizes hands-on experiences and collaborative learning. A four-week project in the middle of the fall semester entails prototyping small-scale wind turbines, allowing students to demonstrate their skills in 3D modeling, 3D printing, experimentation, and data analysis.

The proposed poster will highlight the observed advantages of this project, including streamlined connections among technology (Onshape > Cura > Creality Ender 3 > scroll saw > multimeter & anemometer > Excel) in support of an “analysis” phase of the engineering design process.

This project has undergone numerous revisions. Thus, challenges and mitigation strategies will also be documented – for example, holding individuals accountable in a team project, 3D printing logistics for 150+ students, ensuring student safety, reducing costs, and generating consistently measureable data.

In the most recent version of this project, a team of six pre-service STEM education students helped redevelop the wind turbine testing apparatus. This new approach greatly reduced logistical bottlenecks and first-year student frustrations. An account of the year-to-year lessons learned will be provided.

France, T., & Sierzputowski, W. (2021, March), Lessons Learned from a First-Year Engineering Wind Turbine Project Paper presented at 2021 ASEE North Central Section Conference, University of Toledo, Ohio. 10.18260/1-2--36347

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