The R&D activity as a supporting tool for the active teaching and learning methodology in an engineering course

R&D activities as a supporting tool of the active teaching and learning methodologies in an engineering course has been less explored. This document compares the results obtained after two questionnaires were applied to two different groups of students at the College of Electrical Engineering (FIE) at the Universidad Tecnologica de Panama. The first questionnaire was applied to an undergraduate group of Electromechanical Engineering students. The second questionnaire was applied to FIE faculty members. Both questionnaires try to measure the insertion of R&D results in the curricular content of an engineering course while using the active teaching and learning approach.R&D activities as a supporting tool of the active teaching and learning methodologies in an engineering course has been less explored. This document compares the results obtained after two questionnaires were applied to two different groups of students at the College of Electrical Engineering (FIE) at the Universidad Tecnologica de Panama. The first questionnaire was applied to an undergraduate group of Electromechanical Engineering students. The second questionnaire was applied to FIE faculty members. Both questionnaires try to measure the insertion of R&D results in the curricular content of an engineering course while using the active teaching and learning approach

Freehand Sketching for Engineers: A Pilot Study

This paper describes a pilot study to evaluate Freehand Sketching for Engineers, a one credit, five week course taught to undergraduate engineering students. The short-term goal of this course was to improve engineering students’ freehand sketching ability and to assess their progress with metrics. The long-term objective (desired learning outcome) of this course is to improve the creativity and innovation of student design projects by enhancing students’ ability to visualize their ideas with freehand sketches. The class met two days a week for 75 min per day. Students were taught to draw simple objects such as electrical boxes, with orthographic, isometric, and oblique views on 8 ½ x 11 in. sheets of blank paper (no grid lines) and wooden #2 pencils. No instruments, such as rulers and compasses, were allowed. The course required students to apply what they learned in the classroom and included many examples of hands-on, active and student-centered learning activities. Two assessments were performed to measure whether students improved their ability to freehand sketch. The first involved two outside reviewers (industrial designers) who evaluated each student’s sketch of a pipe fitting that was drawn in the first class (pre-test) and a sketch of the same pipe fitting in the eighth class (after 7 hours of instruction - post-test). Sketches were evaluated using a 1 (poor) to 7 (excellent) Likert scale. The second assessment consisted of an evaluation of the final projects, which were a collection of five sketches with different views of an engineered product. Evaluations of the pre- and post-test drawings and the final projects by outside reviewers and positive observations by engineering faculty suggest that this course has the potential to improve students’ ability to sketch objects. This paper discusses details of the course, provides examples of student sketches, and presents results of outside reviewer assessments. It includes suggestions for a more rigorous assessment of the course to determine its potential to improve students’ ability to sketch objects

Effect of Freshman Chemistry on Student Performance in Sophomore Engineering Courses

The role of first year chemistry courses in engineering programs varies somewhat across programs and disciplines. Clearly most engineering majors will encounter chemistry topics of a general nature in some of their upper-level course work. The purpose of requiring chemistry in the first year, however, goes well beyond learning chemical concepts. As a quantitative science, chemistry requires the use of math, principally algebra, on a regular basis in solving various problems. Students should gain an appreciation of the importance of units in solving problems should come to understand the difference between implicit and explicit properties and should develop other quantitative skills. Depending on how it is taught, chemistry can provide students with a wide range of opportunities to hone skills that will be required in their engineering courses. In discussions with students and even with many faculty, the role of chemistry is often viewed narrowly in terms of the chemistry topics alone. The purpose of this study is to explore how the number of chemistry courses taken and the performance in freshman chemistry affects performance in early engineering courses. Engineering students at the University of New Haven have different requirements for freshman chemistry depending on their particular discipline. All engineering students are required to take at least one freshman chemistry course. Students in chemical and civil engineering are required to take two, students in mechanical and system engineering have an option of biology or a second course in chemistry and students in electrical and computer engineering take only one freshman chemistry course. All engineering students take a sophomore engineering course, Introduction to Modeling of Engineering Systems, which includes topics drawn from electric circuits, mass and energy balances and force balances. The course is designed to help students develop an organized approach to solving problems and uses a conservation and accounting approach to provide a broad framework for the diverse topics. This course provides an opportunity to explore how their freshman chemistry background prepares studcents for engineering coursework. This study examines the impact of having one or two freshman chemistry courses on student performance in the first sophomore level engineering course. The methods used include standard statistical techniques, such as analysis of variance, correlation (eg., Pearson) and t-tests across groups

Enhancing Electrical Engineering Technology Capstone Experience

The College of Science and Technology (COST) at our university (XXX) offers degrees in Mechanical (MET), Civil (CET) and Electrical Engineering Technology (EET). All the Engineering Technology programs are ABET accredited and have been successful in achieving the TAC2000 outcomes. In particular, our Senior Design capstone course (TEET4010/ 4020) is a comprehensive three-credit, two-semester engineering design course, that all engineering majors are required to take as their capstone experience. We view this course as a very important component in the preparation of a trained EET professional. The course emphasizes both hard and soft skills and serves as an emulation of a real world engineering project. We use both, projects proposed by the faculty and projects contributed from local industry and we partner the teams of student with faculty and industry mentors. As a result of their participation in this course, students are subjected to a real world engineering project development experience for the first time. By participating in real engineering projects, students learn to deal with unplanned events such as: missed deadlines, working in team environment and dealing with difficult team members, even dealing with different industry or faculty mentors. From their participation in the course and the project students get a very valuable learning experience. In this paper, we describe the development of our industry-based projects senior design course. In the next sections we describe the role of the capstone design course in respect to ABET academic outcomes. We also present examples of the type of projects implemented and a summary and listing of future work

Work in Progress – Building Innovative Curricula for Electrical and Computer Engineering Programs at the University of Mount Union

Background: The University of Mount Union has introduced new programs in Electrical and Computer engineering. In a liberal arts college with unique curriculum requirements, it is challenging to develop a new program in electrical and computer engineering. With several university mandates such as only 4- and 2-credit hours courses only, and Integrative Core liberal arts requirements, designing the new programs in engineering has been challenging.Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to present the ongoing effort to develop new Electrical and Computer engineering programs at the University of Mount Union. The program curricula are unique as there are no 3-credit hour courses at the Mount Union. Hence, the curricula are content-based as each course content has to be carefully determined.Design and Methods: First, we describe the philosophy we applied in developing the curricula, and then described the curricula themselves using concept diagrams. We point out where the curricula are the same, where they are similar; and where they are distinctly different. Finally, we present the overall plans for developing a comprehensive list of course offerings, course content, acquisition of the necessary laboratory equipment and technologies, teaching software, as well as a time-bound plan for phasing in the new courses every year.Result: The preliminary result is that the first phase of the program\u27s development is complete. Students are currently enrolled in the programs. In the 2019/2020 academic year, all of the first year to junior year courses have been developed and approved by the curriculum committee of the University. The associated laboratories for the new courses are being developed on yearly basis and are nearing completion. With the phased rollout of courses and laboratories, it is expected that all of the laboratories will be fully functional by the 2021-2022 academic year.Conclusion: The ongoing development of Electrical and Computer engineering programs at the University of Mount Union is represented in this paper with the aid of concept maps and course flowgraphs. The roll-out of the programs has been successful and work will continue until the programs are accredited. Meanwhile, the curricula will continue to evolve in response to the rapid pace of technological change, new demands from stakeholders, and new challenges of remote teaching and learning due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We are confident that we can work out any challenges and eventually make the programs successful

Reflections on an Integrated Content and Language Project-Based Design of a Technical Communication Course for Electrical Engineering Students

Effective ways of teaching technical communication skills to engineering students have been much discussed. This article reflects on one setting, a first year course in Technical Communication at a university in Sweden, where electrical engineering teachers, language and communication teachers and student counsellors work in close, team-based cooperation using a project model which requires the students to analyse, implement and communicate technical problems. The paper discusses the change in this course - from an EAP course primarily prioritizing language training which ran parallel with a project course - to one unified ICL course. The progression is described through the changes in the organization of the course, and the article focuses on one learning activity: interdisciplinary tutorials on project reports. Through a pilot study where these sessions were video recorded and mapped, we conclude that the presence of different roles became an asset for the range of what the students see as relevant for their project report. In particular, the technical report genre was critically analysed, including problematic areas such as textual sequencing and display of technical problems; data visualisation and commentary; and referencing

Machine Design Experiments Using Mechanical Springs to Foster Discovery Learning

Machine Design Experiments Using Mechanical Springs to Foster Discover Learning For the typical undergraduate engineering student the topic of mechanical springs is introduced and discussed in several courses. A first exposure may be in a physics course, where springs are presented as idealized mechanical energy storage components. Springs store potential energy,complementing masses that store kinetic energy and dampers that are resistive and offer no energy storage capability. In an electrical circuit course, springs are often presented as the analog of either capacitors or inductors, depending on which analogy is used. For mechanical engineering students, springs are a core component studied in machine design courses, where the nomenclature and design equations are developed for various types of springs. There may be a rudimentary exposure to real springs in a mechanical engineering laboratory; more often,students may see real springs passed around in class and as part of demonstrations.In this paper we describe new experiments that were designed to provide mechanical engineering students with discovery learning experiences with springs. The suite of practical experiments presents students with a range of challenges that require them to analyze, measure, design, and fabricate springs. Activities in the experiments include: (1) Identifying spring types (tension, compression, torsion) and appropriate applications (automotive door latches, bicycle suspensions, pens). (2) Disassembling and re-assembling a padlock (with design and manufacturing questions related to its springs, and measurement of the stiffness of the shackle compression spring). (3) Creating linear and nonlinear stiffnesses from series and parallel combinations of a set of springs (requiring stiffness measurements of the given springs and determining desired stiffnesses to achieve target natural frequencies). (4) Designing linear, hardening, and/or softening springs for different applications, fabricating the springs via rapid prototyping (3D printing), and testing their suitability.In addition to reporting the details of the experiments, we share experiences of students and teaching assistants in their use and effectiveness. We provide insights into how well students became familiar with types and nomenclature of springs and understood the applicability of different springs to actual real-world problems. The intent of the experiments is to effectively enhance mechanical engineering students\u27 awareness of springs and expand their knowledge and confidence in spring design

Evaluation and use of the standards in of the technical drawings in the Final Year Project

In the Industrial Engineering and Chemical Engineering courses of Madrid Polytechnic University the core subjects of Technical Design are taught on the first course but under different names in the first and second four month periods of this degree. The Final Year Project (FYP) is usually the first work in which engineers do a complete engineering project that includes different parts, such as a memory, measuring, budgets and technical drawings. This work sets out to learn and assess the use students make of the knowledge acquired in Technical Drawing subjects when preparing their FYP technical drawings. By analyzing different aspects of 1996 technical drawings included in the FYP about different scopes, it is hoped to be able to see how this specific knowledge is applied to the different specialties (mechanical, electrical, chemistry, etc.) of the degree, as well as the project topics, the type of information contained, the correct use of standards, the tools used to prepare them, etc. The paper has been conducted taking the FYPs of the last 4 years as reference for all the specializations. The purpose of this work was to detect any deficiencies, errors in knowledge, malpractice in execution, etc, in order to have additional information that will enable course content, assessment, and the teaching methodology of the subjects to be adjusted in order to improve teaching. The results of this work are implemented in the contents and practices of the subjects of the technical drawing and a new subject was also purposed

Contrasting three different academic assessments of a compulsory

Published Conference ProceedingsIndustrial Projects IV is a compulsory capstone module for students enrolled for the postgraduate Baccalaureus Technologiae (BTech) in Electrical Engineering (Power) in South Africa. Many graduates from the National Diploma course often struggle to pass this module at their first attempt. This may be due to a number of challenges, such as; struggling to integrate theory with practice; perceiving their postgraduate studies to be overwhelming; feeling anxious as a result of uncertainty about what is expected of them; not knowing how they will be assessed; and finally experiencing a lack of support and understanding from their mentors. The purpose of this paper is to highlight the course structure of a compulsory capstone module offered at a university of technology which has helped students to overcome some of these challenges. The paper further contrasts the assessment results of three different academics that were tasked with mentoring these power engineering students and evaluating their various submissions. Results show that the use of a variety of pedagogies enables postgraduate power engineering students to successfully attain academic success, while predefined rubrics are essential in achieving reliability and validity of assessments among different academics

Improving the freshman electrical and computer engineering lab

This thesis covers the challenges of creating and maintaining an introductory engineering laboratory. The history of the University of Illinois Electrical and Computer Engineering department’s introductory course, ECE 110, is recounted. The current state of the course, as of Fall 2008, is discussed along with current challenges arising from the use of a hand-wired prototyping board with logic gates. A plan for overcoming these issues using a new microcontroller-based board with a pseudo hardware description language is discussed. The new microcontroller based system implementation is extensively detailed along with its new accompanying description language. This new system was tried in several sections of the Fall 2008 semester alongside the old system; the students’ final performances with the two different approaches are compared in terms of design, performance, complexity, and enjoyment. The system in its first run shows great promise, increasing the students’ enjoyment, and improving the performance of their designs