Curricular enhancement to support project-based learning in computer and electrical engineering

Abstract

Undergraduate computer and electrical engineering programs often partition the curriculum into several courses based on related topics taught in isolation. Students are expected to synthesize their knowledge in a senior design project. It is the authors' experience that students often struggle during their senior design project since they have not gained the appropriate knowledge or mastered necessary skills needed to work on a significant or team-based engineering design project. Specifically, students need to be able to define system requirements, partition the design into subcomponents, design, build, test, and verify that the system requirements have been met. The authors have enhanced and implemented three courses to develop system engineering knowledge and skills that better prepare students for their senior design experience. This paper gives an overview and lists the learning outcomes for each of these courses and includes some examples of laboratory projects that are used to meet these learning outcomes. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2008.