Unit Operations Lab Bazaar:  Incorporation of Laboratory Experiences in Six Integrated Pillar Courses

Michael Jefferson Baird; Schohn L. Shannon

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Conference: 2011 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Vancouver, BC
Publication Date: June 26, 2011
Start Date: June 26, 2011
End Date: June 29, 2011
ISSN: 2153-5965
Conference Session: Poster Sessions for Unit Operations Lab Bazaar and Tenure-Track Faculty
Tagged Division: Chemical Engineering
Page Count: 13
Page Numbers: 22.1579.1 - 22.1579.13
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--18374
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/18374
Download Count: 402

Paper Authors

biography

Michael Jefferson Baird University of Pittsburgh

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Dr. Baird joined the chemical engineering department at the University of Pittsburgh in the spring of 2008 as Instructor of Undergraduate Laboratory Courses. He also teaches a graduate course entitled “Petroleum and Natural Gas Processing”. Before joining the University of Pittsburgh, Dr. Baird was an associate professor of chemistry at Wheeling Jesuit University for nine years following his retirement from the U.S. Department of Energy. While at DOE’s National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) in Pittsburgh, Dr. Baird managed projects involving the conversion of coal liquids to gasoline and environmental monitoring of SO2, NOx from coal-fired power plants. From 1978 until 1988, Dr. Baird was employed at Ashland Oil (two years) and at Amoco Oil (eight years), working on hydrocracking and resid processes for producing gasoline. From 1973 until 1978, Baird was a research chemical engineer at the Pittsburgh Energy Research Center (PETC), now NETL, where he worked on Fischer-Tropsch catalysis and process development.

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Schohn L. Shannon University of Pittsburgh

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Dr. Shannon joined the University of Pittsburgh in 1995 as Assistant Dean of Engineering and Chemical Engineering Lecturer following the completion of his Ph.D. at Pitt in 1995. He is also currently Executive Director of the Swanson Center for Product Innovation at Pitt and undergraduate laboratory coordinator for Chemical Engineering . Prior to joining Pitt, he worked in industry as General Manager and then Director of R&D at Altamira Instruments, a manufacturer of catalyst characterization equipment and bench-scale reactor systems. His areas of expertise are in heterogeneous catalysis, reactor design, and steady-state isotopic transient kinetic analysis.

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Abstract

Unit Operations Lab Bazaar: Incorporation of Laboratory Experiences in Six Integrated Pillar CoursesThe NSF-funded “Pillars of Chemical Engineering” program was implemented in 2003, with thetraditional undergraduate courses in chemical engineering restructured into six Pillar or corecourses. The purpose was to develop a completely integrated chemical engineering curriculumwith one of the six Pillar courses taught each term, beginning in the Fall of the sophomore year.The Pillars are designed to introduce students to engineering fundamentals in mass and energybalances, thermodynamics, kinetics, transport phenomena, process control, and design whileproviding an accompanying laboratory experience for each Pillar. These six Pillar courses takeadvantage of block scheduling with each course taught five days per week in two hour sessions –three days for lecture, one day for problem recitation, and one day for an associated laboratorycourse over a fifteen week term.The ability to provide an accompanying laboratory experience for each course, which is often notpossible in a traditional curriculum, is a major advantage in the Pillar curriculum. In eachlaboratory course, students work in teams and each team performs two hands-on experiments persemester. While the primary objective of the accompanying laboratory experiences is toreinforce the student’s understanding of the lecture material with hands-on application, thelaboratory courses are structured to develop and test student’s abilities to organize, work withinteams, develop experimental capabilities, analyze data, and follow through on technical projectswith a concentrated effort on practicing communication skills – both written and oral.Hence, an additional major advantage of the Pillar format is it permits the implementation,starting in the sophomore year, of structured laboratory experiences involving a total of twelvedifferent experiments throughout the undergraduate studies. This structure enables repeatedreinforcement which enhances their theoretical understanding of the material and provides forlonger term development of the student’s teaming, technical, experimental, and communicationskills.This paper discusses the required logistics that have been developed at the University ofPittsburgh to handle laboratory courses that accompany our Pillar courses and their advantagesas well as potential disadvantages. It presents a preliminary assessment of the effectiveness ofthis approach based upon a 5-point Likert scale student survey.

Citation
Format

Baird, M. J., & Shannon, S. L. (2011, June), Unit Operations Lab Bazaar: Incorporation of Laboratory Experiences in Six Integrated Pillar Courses Paper presented at 2011 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Vancouver, BC. 10.18260/1-2--18374

TY  - CPAPER
AB  -            Unit Operations Lab Bazaar: Incorporation of Laboratory                  Experiences in Six Integrated Pillar CoursesThe NSF-funded “Pillars of Chemical Engineering” program was implemented in 2003, with thetraditional undergraduate courses in chemical engineering restructured into six Pillar or corecourses. The purpose was to develop a completely integrated chemical engineering curriculumwith one of the six Pillar courses taught each term, beginning in the Fall of the sophomore year.The Pillars are designed to introduce students to engineering fundamentals in mass and energybalances, thermodynamics, kinetics, transport phenomena, process control, and design whileproviding an accompanying laboratory experience for each Pillar. These six Pillar courses takeadvantage of block scheduling with each course taught five days per week in two hour sessions –three days for lecture, one day for problem recitation, and one day for an associated laboratorycourse over a fifteen week term.The ability to provide an accompanying laboratory experience for each course, which is often notpossible in a traditional curriculum, is a major advantage in the Pillar curriculum. In eachlaboratory course, students work in teams and each team performs two hands-on experiments persemester. While the primary objective of the accompanying laboratory experiences is toreinforce the student’s understanding of the lecture material with hands-on application, thelaboratory courses are structured to develop and test student’s abilities to organize, work withinteams, develop experimental capabilities, analyze data, and follow through on technical projectswith a concentrated effort on practicing communication skills – both written and oral.Hence, an additional major advantage of the Pillar format is it permits the implementation,starting in the sophomore year, of structured laboratory experiences involving a total of twelvedifferent experiments throughout the undergraduate studies. This structure enables repeatedreinforcement which enhances their theoretical understanding of the material and provides forlonger term development of the student’s teaming, technical, experimental, and communicationskills.This paper discusses the required logistics that have been developed at the University ofPittsburgh to handle laboratory courses that accompany our Pillar courses and their advantagesas well as potential disadvantages. It presents a preliminary assessment of the effectiveness ofthis approach based upon a 5-point Likert scale student survey.
AU  - Michael Jefferson Baird
AU  - Schohn L. Shannon
CY  - Vancouver, BC
DA  - 2011/06/26
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Unit Operations Lab Bazaar:  Incorporation of Laboratory Experiences in Six Integrated Pillar Courses
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/18374
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--18374
ER  -