Faculty are planning a complete overhaul of the undergraduate curriculum in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering that is designed to revamp the way students think about problems in engineering.
Faculty are planning a complete overhaul of the undergraduate curriculum in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering that is designed to revamp the way students think about problems in engineering.
Starting in 2006, freshmen will begin their ECE curricula with a hands-on course featuring a project that will be threaded through four core upper-level classes. The goal is to let the theories of engineering flow from real-world products like iPods and medical devices.
“This is much more a change in the way we teach as opposed to what we teach,” said Lisa Huettel, assistant professor of the practice in electrical and computer engineering.
Under the current curriculum students often have to wade through several introductory courses before they get a chance to explore applications for any information. Faculty said students sometimes leave engineering because they do not get a chance to actually create useful things.
“Ultimately what we as engineers try to do is invent things that improve the quality of life,” said Gary Ybarra, director of undergraduate studies for ECE, noting that the early lab work is often formulaic. “We want to move away from recipe, cookbook approaches to laboratory work.”
The ECE project is largely funded by a three-year grant from the National Science Foundation that totals more than $1 million. Leslie Collins, associate professor of ECE and principle investigator, said the amount of money for teaching engineering was unprecedented but necessary for the project to materialize. “As you can imagine taking apart and putting back together an entire curriculum is quite an undertaking,” she said.
The department recently created a position for director of undergraduate laboratories, which Huettel now holds. Laboratory work will be integrated into the entire program. The four basic fields of ECE will be introduced through the lab work. Eventually, elective classes will also draw from the experimental work in the introductory classes.
“We want to show students who think they’re interested in ECE what different fields there are in ECE,” Huettel said. “Our goal is to show them the breadth of fields.”
ECE’s proposed revisions follow a revamping of the introductory undergraduate classes several years ago that were designed to let freshmen experience the actual process of invention that drives engineering.
“You motivate people by what they’re passionate about,” said Kristina Johnson, dean of the Pratt School of Engineering. “So the way you look at performance is you take something that’s very cool and requires all of the components of interdisciplinarity and you explain them through the application of product.”
Planning began about a year ago, and the entire faculty, regardless of rank, has been involved in the effort. In addition to multiple faculty committees that will construct each individual course, one committee is dedicated to integrating applications through each course. Outside consultants will also evaluate the curriculum as it develops.
Faculty said such a time-intensive teaching project would have been nearly impossible several years ago, because untenured faculty would not have been able to devote time to teaching rather than to research. Ybarra and others noted, however, that the school has emphasized the importance of teaching in the tenure process.
Johnson said the school has stressed the importance of teaching at least since she became dean in 1999. About half of Pratt’s departments are focusing on undergraduate education while the other areas focus on graduate training.
The new curriculum is also part of a long-term trend toward interdisciplinary thinking, Collins said.
Several years ago, the department adjusted the electrical engineering major so that students could elect for a hybrid electrical and computer engineering program. When the new changes are fully implemented, faculty said the classic electrical engineering degree will likely disappear completely. “I think it’s a recognition that over the last decade a lot of the interest, student interest, has been in computer engineering,” Johnson said, noting that electrical engineering is increasingly dependent on computers.
In response, ECE has been collaborating more with the computer science department in Arts and Sciences. A joint task force has been examining the relationship between the two departments for the past year. The task force will continue to work with the curriculum revision committee to increase flexibility.
“We do feel like it’s time to revisit what it is we’re teaching and if it’s what we still need to be teaching,” Collins said.
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