Teaching strategies and industrial cooperation in a process design course

Abstract

The teaching strategy for a process design course at Universidad del Valle, one of the most traditional schools of Chemical Engineering in Colombia, is presented. The strategy is designed to strengthen the engineering skills, and also the so called "transferable" skills (i.e., teamwork, communication, self evaluation, and creativity) of the ChE students, and to provide studies of interest for the local industrial sector. The class activities are designed to explore aspects related to teamwork, process synthesis, process safety, cost estimation and application of economic engineering concepts. Each class session is followed by a workshop in which the students work in teams and immediately practice the concepts previously studied. We use cooperative learning by asking each team to select one leader of process technology, one of market intelligence, and one of economic evaluation, and by offering specific workshops on these topics to the respective leaders, whom are responsible for teaching their teammates. The subject of the design project is defined in consultation with engineers from industry, which act as external consultants for each project during the semester. The final assessment of each project is made by practicing engineers. Follow up and guidance are provided by the instructor and two graduate assistants. Each semester the projects are organized in a CD-ROM, which contains useful information, articles and patents included, such that any potential investor can easily find relevant information. Topics studied in the last few years include lactic acid, fuel alcohol, biodiesel, and several high-added-value products from industrial waste.