DARPA's digital system design curriculum and peer-reviewed educational infrastructure

Abstract

As part of DARPA's $150 M Rapid Prototyping of Application Specific Signal Processors (RASSP) program, the RASSP Education & Facilitation (RASSP E&F) team consisting of SCRA, Georgia Institute of Technology, University of Virginia, University of Cincinnati, Raytheon, and Arthur D. Little has developed a new digital system design curriculum and supporting course infrastructure in the form of an electronic archive of instructional material - course modules, labs, projects, and interactive educational CD-ROMs. Included in this electronic archive or digital library are over 200 hours of instructional material suitable for immediate insertion at the undergraduate and graduate levels. To date, over 80 educational institutions have obtained educational material developed by the RASSP E&F team. In this paper, we present the technical goals and rationale, including an Educational Maturity Model (EMM), motivating our efforts. Additional details are available on our WWW server: 〈http://rassp.scra.org〉.