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Session 3461

Senior Capstone as Liberal Education

Bijan Pashaie, John C. Kraemer*, and David K. Probst

Department of Physics and Engineering Physics *Environmental Science Program Southeast Missouri State University

The Engineering Physics Program at Southeast Missouri State University received initial accreditation from the EAC of ABET in 2001. One lingering concern from that process was that students did not get sufficient experience on multidisciplinary teams because the program has low enrollment and primarily an electrical engineering flavor. Another lingering concern was that the Engineering Physics degree, as the only engineering program at Southeast, requires about 12 more credit hours than most other programs on campus, which might tend to reduce its competitiveness when recruiting majors. In order to address these concerns, we developed a senior capstone course that has been accepted into the University Studies Program, which is Southeast’s liberal education program. It therefore counts both in the major and for the liberal education program, thus reducing the total number of hours required. The course requires students from at least two departments on campus to work on a project requiring expertise from both disciplines. In Spring 2004, in collaboration with a faculty member in the Environmental Science Program, students will design and construct a ph-sensitive, solid-state sensor to determine the concentration of organophosphates in groundwater in the region around the University. This project has the added benefit of providing an instrument to address a serious regional problem, so external funding for it has been requested from a state agency. This paper will describe the course and the project that will be used for teaching it for the first time.

I. Introduction

The Engineering Physics Program at Southeast Missouri State University integrates a typical physics program and a typical electrical engineering program. The Program has a core set of courses and two options. The Applied Physics and Engineering (APE) Option consists of additional physics and electrical engineering courses and the Computer Applications in Physics and Engineering (CAPE) Option consists of computer science and digital electronics courses. All programs at Southeast must also satisfy a liberal education component that consists of forty- eight hours. Of this, only nine hours were satisfied as part of our program, but with the addition of this course, twelve hours will be satisfied.

Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering Education

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Kraemer, J., & Pashaie, B., & Probst, D. (2004, June), Senior Capstone As Liberal Education Paper presented at 2004 Annual Conference, Salt Lake City, Utah. 10.18260/1-2--12999