Mr. Ali Warsame, Dr. Paul O. Biney, Dr. James O. Morgan
Prairie View A&MUniversity, Prairie View, Texas 77446
It is advantageous to start integration of design into the engineering curriculum at the freshman level, where engineering creativity can be effectively introduced.The second course of a two-semester freshmen Creative Engineering sequence is the focus of the freshmen design plans presented in this paper.This course sequence was the result of a NSF funded project [1] on ``Development of a Freshman Engineering Curriculum'' at Prairie View A&MUniversity.
A successfully tested innovative approach for teaching design at the freshmen level is discussed. The ability of freshmen to design, fabricate and test simple engineering systems is also discussed and demonstrated. The result of this strategy is that the students are able to work in teams on integrated projects (such as the Sunrayce, FutureCar Challenge and Hybrid Vehicle projects) required in the senior year. This experience makes the student highly successful in the modern design environment.
Creative Engineering is a two semester freshmen design sequence developed by the authors at Prairie View A&MUniversity. The courses have been taught since Fall of 1991 and are required of all engineering majors. The first course emphasizes solid modeling, generation of working drawings, and engineering specifications. A design project (requiring the generation of a solid model for the production of working drawings, specifications, and preparation of a bid package for the design) is assigned. The second course is a pure design course that requires the student to use the basic principles acquired in the first course to design, build and test a project assigned in the beginning of the semester.
Participative learning methods are used in the second semester Creative Engineering. The instructor basically guides the students through the design process, actively involving students in the process. Students work in design teams consisting of four to six students per team. Students meet within their groups in class and out of class to apply the various stages of the design process. The students are in constant communication with the instructor, who critiques the students' design work. Group and individual assignments are given in the class. The rationale for this approach is that, even in a group project, it is important for individual members to think about solution methods ahead of time to enable them to offer meaningful contributions during group discussion. The final grade of the project has two principal components, the individual component and the group component. As a result of this grading scheme, members in the same group do not necessarily get the same grades.
Prior to the beginning of the semester, the instructors meet to discuss project selection for the semester. The project selected should meet the following criteria:
Using these guidelines, the instructors formulate a total of six to eight design problem statements. A tradition in the past two years has been to include the ASEE National Design Graphic and the ASME National Design problem statements in the pool of design problems for the class. The class syllabus is jointly prepared for all sections of the class. Three sections of Creative Engineering II are offered in the Spring and two sections in the Fall.
Design groups consisting of 4 to 6 students are formed on the first or second class meeting. Before formation of groups, pre-requisites and co-requisites are checked for each student. The pre-requisites for the course are Creative Engineering I and Calculus I. In addition, the student should have passed Computer Applications, and Speech courses. The co-requisite is Physics I. The cumulative GPA in the courses listed above are computed for each student. The students are then classified as above average (GPA > 3.0), average (GPA 2.5-2.99), and below average (GPA < 2.5). The instructor in each class then assigns students into groups ensuring that each group contains a mix of above average, average and below average students. Our objective is to ensure that a group is not made up of all above average or all below average students. Once the groups are formed, the project statements are distributed to the students. The groups are required to meet in order to complete the first assignment, consisting of determining a weekly group out-of-class meeting schedule agreeable to all group members. Each group transforms the agreement on the weekly meeting schedule into a binding agreement signed by each member. The agreement can be changed if all the members in the group decide on a new schedule, but until that is done the existing agreement is binding.
Project selection is done about the beginning of the second week of class, when the students have had time to review the project statements individually and in groups. On the selection day, all the projects are written on ballot papers, and each group selects one project at random from the ballot pool. When all groups have picked projects from the pool, they are allowed to negotiate with other groups to swap projects if they so desire. In most instances, groups are able to successfully negotiate with other groups to select a project to their liking. The instructors try as much as possible to give different projects to each group, except the national design competitions for which two groups can be assigned to work on independently. After project selection, each group selects a group leader and the assistant group leader. Since each group is required to produce a working model or prototype of its design, the College provides each group a spending account with a maximum of $100.00. Students can purchase any hardware required for the project and submit all receipts not exceeding the $100limit for reimbursement.
The primary objective of the design process application is to enable aspiring engineering students to apply their innovative and creative ideas to a design problem by employing basic principles of the physical and engineering sciences. To design a project, certain steps have to be followed. These steps include: problem identification, preliminary ideas, design refinement, analysis, and implementation. Each stage has specific guidelines and literature to explain their purpose. Homework assignments about the design processes are assigned to each group in order to apply their specific project. A brief description of the design stages taught in the course is described in this section. Application of each of the design stages to the design of a medicine bottle opener by one group of students in the Spring 1994 class is used as demonstration of what the students typically do in the class.
Three project presentations are conducted during the semester. The first presentation is done after the preliminary ideas stage of the design process, the second after the analysis stage and the third after the implementation stage. These presentations are conducted to help prepare them for the final project presentation. All of the presentations are videotaped and used to improve the students' communication and presentation techniques. Each presentation spans a total of 15 minutes, 12 minutes of which is used by the group in presenting the project and the remaining 3 minutes reserved for questions and answers.
The fourth and final project presentation is held a week prior to the dead week of the semester. Industrial panelists are invited to judge the projects and select the best three for awards. The presentations normally start at 8:00 am and may end by 12:30 pm for a typical combined section of 16 groups. Each member of the winning group is awarded $50.00 towards payment of tuition fees. Members in the second and third place get $30.00 and $20.00 respectively towards their tuition. In the Fall of 1994, General Electric (GE) sponsored the Creative Engineering II projects and the students received cash awards donated by GE.
Student projects from the Creative Engineering II Spring 1994 Semester classes were entered in the international design competition sponsored by the design graphics division of the ASEE in Edmonton, Alberta in Canada from June 25 to June 28, 1994. Student teams worked independently on the design of a medicine bottle opener. The first, second and third place designs were selected by a panel of invited industrial judges at a presentation held on April 29, 1994 at Prairie View A&MUniversity. These three were submitted for the competition [2,3,4]. Dr. Paul O. Biney and Mr. Ali Warsame, two faculty members of Prairie View A&MUniversity who taught the course were selected as judges for the competition. Dr Morgan presented the results of the Freshmen Engineering Curriculum Development at an ASEE Conference [5]. Additional results of the project were presented at a symposium at Prairie View A&MUniversity in October 1994 [6].
The College of Engineering &Architecture has benefitted greatly from the National Science Foundation (NSF) funded project on ``Development of a Freshman Engineering Curriculum at Prairie View A&MUniversity'' . Well- structured Freshmen level design courses ( Creative Engineering I &II sequence) have been fully developed and implemented in the freshmen curriculum. This course sequence requires that Calculus, Physics and Technical Communications be pre- or co-requisites for the courses. This sequence has increased the creativity and motivation of the students and has helped throughout their studies. Data compiled by the College indicate that retention rate from the freshmen to the sophomore level has increased by more than 50%since the inception of the Creative Engineering courses. The courses serve as a medium for introducing oral and written communication skills for the freshmen. The students acquire the skills of creating solid computer models of their creative designs, making them better prepared for other design courses in the engineering curriculum. A first-class Computer Aided Engineering Lab has been set up and is used in the Creative Engineering courses and other design courses in the college. The best projects for Creative Engineering II have been entered in an international design competition, thereby, giving international exposure to the successful outcome of this project.
Workshops have been successfully organized to train personnel to use the selected solid modeling software and to understand the organization of the Creative Engineering courses, and the interactive teaching techniques used in the course sequence.
In conclusion, the Creative Engineering sequence of courses has been highly successful, has greatly enhanced the freshman program and will help in the development of the new breed of engineers well-endowed with creativity and exceptional communications skills. Plans to develop long term statistics on the effectiveness of these courses as related to retention are in progress. Also, there are plans to establish short courses and workshops so that other institutions could provide a similar program.