Promoting Awareness Of, And Sharing Good Practices On, Supporting Engineering Students With Disabilities

The amount of literature that focuses on diversity and inclusion within engineering education continues to grow. However, research traditionally focuses on gender, and despite the United Nations Convention for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) being passed in 2016, there is still a lack of work which describes the experience of students with disabilities....Robot Dynamic

80 Years of Aerospace Engineering Education in the Netherlands

This year, 2020, the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands celebrates its 80th birthday. This paper describes the history of the department since its founding in early 1940, just before the start of World War II in the Netherlands, until present day. The paper will highlight how its research and education developed within the socio-economic context of the Netherlands and the developments in aerospace over the past 80 years

Educating Future Robotics Engineers In Multidisciplinary Approaches In Robot Software Design

In 2020, a new two-year MSc programme in robotics was launched. Unlike most existing robotics programmes, which approach robotics from a specific discipline, this programme aims to train multi-deployable robot generalists using a cognitive approach (no hardware creation). The field of robotics is multidisciplinary by nature and educating students on how to approach projects with a multidisciplinary mindset is at the forefront of the programme. Hence, at the end of the first year, students are thrust into experiencing the true multi-disciplinarity of the robotics field in a synthesizing, multidisciplinary project-based course. In this 5 EC course, students work together in groups of 5 on an industry-based assignment making a translation of societal issues from different perspectives (human, sustainability, safety, ethics, economic, etc.) into intelligent robot solutions. Each team develops and tests a complete, integrated software package for a complex robot system in a simulated environment and implements it in a real robot at the end of the course. Various robots are used, each related to a different case study which is taken on by multiple teams. Students are supported in their project with workshops and minilectures on transferable skills, systems engineering and the Robot Operating System (ROS). This paper describes the development, implementation, and results of the course over its first three years of running. It will present lessons learned from the perspectives of all parties involved: lecturers, technical staff, industry, and students as well as future plans and recommendations for others looking at creating similar courses

The effectiveness of an activity to practise communication competencies: a case study across five European engineering universities

Although accreditation bodies emphasise communication competencies development in engineering curricula due to its importance for future engineers, the focus is often mainly on oral presentation and written reports. A communication activity was created to practice and reflect on students’ communication competencies including describing information in a short time, listening skills, and ask and respond to questions. This activity was implemented at five different European engineering universities involving 393 students. This study explores the effectiveness of this activity as a case-study of game-based learning to practise and reflect on engineering students’ communication competencies. A mixed-method approach measuring students’ communication performance, their perceived communication competencies, and the benefits of this activity to students was used to explore the game characteristics that make the activity effective. The findings of the scoring rubric and the questionnaire used showed that this activity is effective. Because it is engaging and set by rules, students actively participated during the activity, reflected on their effective and ineffective communication competencies, the existing communication barriers and styles, gained awareness, experienced communication in teams, and cooperated with different people. This study highlights the effectiveness of a small intervention using a proven communication activity, which is freely available as OpenCourseWare through TU Delft for anyone to use.This work was partially supported by FCT-Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia within the R&D Units Project Scope UIDB/00319/2020 and by the Erasmusthorn program of the European Union (grant agreement 575778-EPP-1-2016-1-BE-EPPKA2-KA)

Ir Koo Siu Ling the first female aerospace engineer in the Netherlands

The first woman to graduate from our faculty, then known as ‘Vliegtuigbouwkunde’ (Aeronautical engineering) was Koo Siu Ling. She was an international student from Indonesia of Chinese descent. When she registered to study ‘Vliegtuigbouwkunde’, it made the newspapers, both in the Netherlands and in Indonesia. She would start her studies in 1956 at the age of 16.Aerospace Structures & Material

The Future of Women Aerospace Engineers in Academia: a numbers game

The gender divide for women in the engineering domain in academia is still very large today, even though most institutions are committed to changing this. Although there are slow improvements in the number of women working in academic positions in Engineering, the Netherlands, in particular, is still lagging badly behind the rest of Europe with women making up only 17.6% of all full professors in the engineering domain and for 25.7% in the entire academic domain. This is despite many efforts across the board to improve this situation. The situation is even worse in the field of Aerospace Engineering and within this field, the lack of progress is not unique to the Netherlands with similar issues being reported in the United States of America and wider afield. This paper reports on research on the capacity building among women required within the aerospace engineering domain to reach the commonly defined critical mass percentage of 30% of women full professors using metrics on career progress and on as well as labour market data on the career development of Aerospace graduates to show where potential new interventions can be made.Aerospace Structures & Material

ir Koo Siu Ling de eerste vrouwelijke ingenieur luchtvaart en ruimtevaarttechniek in Nederland

De eerste vrouw die afstudeerde aan onze faculteit – die destijds ‘Vliegtuigbouwkunde’ heette – was Koo Siu Ling. Ze was een buitenlandse student uit Indonesië van Chinese afkomst. Toen ze zich aanmeldde voor de opleiding vliegtuigbouwkunde haalde dat zowel in Nederland als in Indonesië de krant. Ze begon met haar studie in 1956, toen ze 16 jaar was.Aerospace Structures & Material