Practicing needs-based, human-centered design for electrical engineering project course innovation

Abstract

In order to be fully prepared for the engineering workforce, students should tackle design challenges that are both contextually and technically deep. This paper details a curricular innovation in a junior-level, project-based electrical engineering course within the Department of Engineering in Arizona State University's College of Technology and Innovation. Teams of engineering students were asked to develop design project briefs based on the needs of a user or user group of their own choosing and then implement a technical prototype in one semester. Student work from a class with this needs-based, human-centered design pedagogical approach is described. © 2012 American Society for Engineering Education.