Thursday Sessions
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Thursday Sessions Thursday Sessions Session T1A: Mini Workshop - Great Problems Lead to Great Projects: A First Year Seminar Course Chair: Kristin Wobbe, Worcester Polytechnic Institute Time: Thursday, October 28, 2010, 8:00 am - 9:30 am Salon A MINI WORKSHOP - GREAT PROBLEMS LEAD TO GREAT PROJECTS: A FIRST YEAR SEMINAR COURSE Kristin Wobbe and Arthur Heinricher In 2007 WPI initiated the Great Problems Seminars to engage First Year students with current events, societal problems and human needs while developing skills that will facilitate subsequent project work. These seminars focus on large global issues – energy and its utilization, food and hunger, disease and healthcare delivery and the NAE Grand Challenges. Each is led by two faculty from disparate departments who expose the students to the complexity of the problem using a number of disciplinary perspectives. Students develop information literacy, effective writing and speaking skills, while working in teams on short assignments. For the final project student teams work with faculty supervision to analyze some aspect of the problem and/or develop a partial solution. The seminars culminate in a Project presentation day where all student groups present a poster on their work. We have assessment data that show that the courses achieve their desired outcomes. The special session will review the motivation to create these courses and provide information about course organization and logistics. Participants will review student projects, discuss the preparation required, and determine how elements of this program can be utilized on their home campus. Ideas generated by participants will be shared with all. Session T1B: Special Session - Mixed Methods in Engineering Education: Developing Research Questions and Mixing Tables Chair: Erin Crede, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University Time: Thursday, October 28, 2010, 8:00 am - 9:30 am Salon B SPECIAL SESSION - MIXED METHODS IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION: DEVELOPING RESEARCH QUESTIONS AND MIXING TABLES Erin Crede, Maura Borrego and Elizabeth Creamer The aim of this special session is to re-introduce the concept of “mixing” as a part of a mixed methods study design. Engineering education researchers are increasingly choosing mixed methods for their study designs, but may not be obtaining the full benefit from their use. In order to highlight specific aspects of the definition of mixed methods research, groups will establish a qualitative, quantitative and “mixing” research questions using the topic of Engineering Student Retention. Through collaborative development of the mixing research question, participants will be exposed to various ways to integrate qualitative and quantitative data. After discussing the combinations of qualitative, quantitative and mixing research questions in the large group, participant teams will sketch out possible mixing tables that integrate their qualitative and quantitative data. Creation of the mixing tables will further explore the integration possibilities, allowing participants to explore ways to maximize the potential of their data. This session is highly collaborative and encourages participation from researchers from all backgrounds (qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods) and experience levels. Session T1C: Curriculum Innovations in Teaching Design Chair: Eric Pappas, James Madison University Time: Thursday, October 28, 2010, 8:00 am - 9:30 am Salon C AN INTERDISCIPLINARY SENIOR DESIGN EXPERIENCE USING BIODIESEL VEHICLES Steven G. Northrup An interdisciplinary team design experience has been conducted successfully for several years as part of the senior engineering laboratory effort at Western New England College. Recent modifications to the project include the adaptation of a biodiesel powered airplane engine to power a land-based vehicle. The project objectives are to introduce the students to the design process typically associated with new product development. The approach is to have student teams develop a biodiesel powered vehicle prototype which can transport payloads between two points up a sloped parking surface as quickly as possible. The effort requires the parallel development of a computerized performance prediction system, the vehicle itself, and electrical and computer systems to gather data to validate the 978-1-4244-6262-9/10/$26.00 ©2010 IEEE October 27-30, 2010 Arlington, Virginia 40th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference 77 Thursday Sessions performance prediction. The students enjoy the effort and learn a lot about real world product design and development problems including team dynamics. This paper describes the details of the design experience, discusses efforts that were found to be both successful and unsuccessful, and presents sample team prototype results. LOW COST RUNWAY INCURSION DETECTION SYSTEM FOR GENERAL AVIATION AIRPORTS. Ibibia Dabipi, J. Bryan Burrows-McElwain and Chris Hartman LOW COST RUNWAY INCURSION DETECTION SYSTEM FOR GENERAL AVIATION AIRPORTS. I.K. Dabipi, J.B. Burrows-McElwain, C. Hartman University of Maryland Eastern Shore, (phone: 410-651-6489, (fax: 410-651-6486) [email protected], [email protected], [email protected] The purpose of this paper is to introduce the reader to a freshman engineering design project where students were required to design a novel low cost runway incursion detection system that might have future application for small general aviation airport operations by applying sound engineering problem solving criterion. Given the direction of Aviation towards autonomous navigation, this project provides a meaningful medium to educate freshman engineering students on both concept and teamwork principles. The goals of the project were (a) to introduce collaboration across disciplines given the students’ intended majors, (b) to enhance scientific inquiry, (c) to foster communication among the group as well as enhance communication between the students and the client who provides the project objectives, and (d) the group management structure and its implication as it applies to achieving the overall objectives of the project. As an integrated department with both Engineering and Aviation Science faculty, it was natural for the Aviation Science faculty to serve as clients, who then generate plausible problems that can benefit both the Aviation Science and Engineering students in the program and these problems are then used as the basis for a structured engineering design approach for introducing engineering design fundamentals to the freshman engineering class. The unique nature of the assignment lies in the need for the concept to be low cost and practical. Team leadership styles were evaluated and compared against design outcomes. This paper examines both the engineering aspect of the students’ learning as well as their leadership growth and interaction between group members as well as the interaction with the client. With students from various engineering backgrounds involved in the course, this paper also provides the audience the ability to examine the applicability of this approach to other subject areas. APPLICATION OF MODERN ENGINEERING TOOLS IN THE ANALYSIS OF THE STEPPED SHAFT: TEACHING A STRUCTURED PROBLEM-SOLVING APPROACH USING ENERGY TECHNIQUES Carla J. Egelhoff, Edwin M. Odom and Benjamin J. Wiest The importance of analysis and design of shafts is well-described in most Machine Design textbooks. Shafts are subjected to both combined and variable loading, resulting in fatigue-mode stress and deflection; to further complicate the calculations, many shafts are of a stepped or tapered cross-sectional area. A thorough review of the textbooks available and the wider body of mechanical engineering literature revealed a paucity of strategies for either teaching or conducting the analysis required for proper design. In this paper we describe a structured problem-solving approach which uses the students’ understanding of free-body-diagrams, shear and moment equations, and energy methods. With the development of note-taking handouts supplied to the students, the structured analysis is lead by the instructor using Castigliano’s theory of internal energy. The problem formulation is kept general until the last step. The numerical integration can be performed software of the students’ choice. We have found that using this approach accomplishes a richer, deeper understanding of design among our students and increases their confidence as indicated by our pre- and post-activity assessment. WORK IN PROGRESS - IMPACT OF EARLY DESIGN INSTRUCTION ON CAPSTONE EXPERIENCES Mark L. Chang and Jessica Townsend In the Olin College curriculum, students have significant, early, and continuous exposure to user-oriented design principles. As a result, our students have a very user-centered approach to problem solving that has affected our yearlong, industry-sponsored capstone in several ways. We have reflected on five years of capstone engagements in order to learn how our program has changed because of the design emphasis in our curriculum. The significance of our work is to inform the many departments that are already undertaking design-centric curriculum reform on how they may modify their capstone experiences to best take advantage of new student understanding, and what to expect when using design principles to engage industry problems. INNOVATIVE APPROACH TO TEACHING UNDERGRADUATE REINFORCED CONCRETE DESIGN Nathan Rumsey, Jonathan Russell and Kassim Tarhini This paper highlights innovative teaching techniques aimed