Paper Authors

Abstract

NOTE: The first page of text has been automatically extracted and included below in lieu of an abstract

Session 2632

Real Electromagnetics for Real Engineers – Really!

Shreekanth A. Mandayam and Robert R. Krchnavek Rowan University

Abstract

This paper describes a sequence of classes – Engineering Electromagnetics I and II that is offered every Fall semester to Junior-level Electrical & Computer Engineering students at Rowan University. The instructors were motivated by a strong desire to make the learning of electromagnetics relevant – not only to other concurrent and subsequent engineering classes that the students take, but also to post-baccalaureate experiences in industry and graduate school. Moreover, since this course has long been feared by students as one of the toughest in the curriculum, the instructors tried to make leaning electromagnetics fun. Instructional techniques that were employed by the professors were based on a significant laboratory component that included numerical modeling, visualization and experimentation. This paper describes classroom/laboratory activity during the Fall 2000 semester offering of this course sequence.

I. Introduction

One of the unique challenges in the new Electrical & Computer Engineering program at Rowan University is to create and effectively deliver courses in the curriculum in 7-week integrated laboratory-lecture modules. These courses complement the semester-long design projects known as “Clinics” that students are required to take every semester of their curriculum. As a team of instructors who teach the Engineering Electromagnetics (EEMAG) I and II sequence, we were motivated by a desire to create a set of courses, that require students to do real and relevant engineering electromagnetics – and utilize these skills effectively in later courses and clinic projects. It is difficult to tackle all topics in a 7-week period so care must be taken to emphasize key topics and strengthen understanding through real-world laboratory exercises. We present some examples of a successful implementation of these objectives in this paper. We discuss numerous real-world applications that are studied during our single semester sequence of courses. We also show how the topics covered in the EEMAG I course are utilized in other courses/projects in the curriculum.

In the first seven weeks of the semester, EEMAG I covers electrostatics, magnetostatics and quasistatics – details are provided in the course website1. In the second half of the semester, in EEMAG II, students tackle time-varying electromagnetic fields. Each of these courses contains an integrated laboratory component. The class meets every week for three 1-hour lecture periods and

Proceedings of the 2001 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright  2001, American Society for Engineering Education

• Citation

• Format
  • APA
  • APA - LaTeX bibitem
  • MLA
  • MLA - LaTeX bibitem
  • Bibtex
  • EndNote - RIS

Krchnavek, R., & Mandayam, S. (2001, June), Real Electromagnetics For Real Engineers Really! Paper presented at 2001 Annual Conference, Albuquerque, New Mexico. 10.18260/1-2--9712