Some classes are harder to get into than others, but ECE 27 is unique. Students have to enter a lottery for spots.
Titled "Fundamentals of ECE," the course-offered for the first time this spring-is the product of an ongoing redevelopment of the undergraduate curriculum in electrical and computer engineering.
In Fall 2004, the department received a grant of nearly $1 million from the National Science Foundation's Engineering Education Program to redesign the curriculum. This semester, students began to see the first results of the project: the new ECE 27 course and changes to two other ECE classes.
Spearheading the project are faculty members Leslie Collins, associate professor of electrical and computer engineering, Gary Ybarra, professor of the practice of ECE, and Lisa Huettel, director of undergraduate laboratories for ECE and assistant professor of the practice of ECE.
Collins said they aimed to increase the program's emphasis on the creative side of engineering and better integrate design into the curriculum.
"Students weren't getting enough hands-on experience," Collins said.
Starting this fall, the department will introduce new versions of all core classes, and modifications to several electives will come later.
"We've added a lab, or we've added some significant design experience [to each course]," Collins explained.
She noted that such broad changes might not have been possible without NSF funding.
Current ECE majors will be able to choose between the old and the new course structures.
One additional novelty for students enrolled this spring in ECE 27, which is currently taught by Huettel, is the use of Tablet PCs in class instruction and projects. A grant from Hewlett-Packard provided computers the professor now loans to students.
Huettel's pilot offering of the course has received praise for many reasons, said Ybarra, who will be one of two professors teaching sections of the class in the fall. He emphasized the course's integration of many topics within ECE.
"This will enable students to see the big picture instead of isolated components of the field," Ybarra said. "I can imagine that the demand for the course is going to increase significantly after the incredible experience [current students] have had."
He noted that there will be no enrollment cap on the class this fall and that future students will have to share the use of the Tablet PCs.
Junior John Kang, one of four undergraduate teaching assistants for ECE 27 this semester, praised the "hands-on" learning the course fosters. Students voluntarily spend many extra hours working on their robotics-based design project, he said.
"They're tinkering on these machines. They have all sorts of problems. They don't give up," Kang explained. "I think people will enjoy [the new curriculum] a lot more."
Gary Gabriele, director of the NSF's engineering education and centers division, said that fostering such student creativity-"to make sure that engineering education doesn't become too analysis- and science-based"-is a main goal of the grant program from which the University has benefitted. Ultimately, he explained, other universities should be able to learn from Duke's experience.
"Innovation is key to sustaining the nation's economic health," Gabriele said. "And innovation is the core of what engineers do."
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