Collaborative Research: A Systems-Centric Foundation for Electrical and Computer Engineering Education

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PARTICIPATING ORGANIZATIONS:Northern Arizona UniversityUniversity of Vermont & State Agricultural CollegeUniversity of South FloridaUniversity of HawaiiUniversity of Minnesota-Twin CitiesPROJECT DESCRIPTIONThis project is developing an educational model that pioneers the integration of circuits and systems concepts, forming a new set of conceptual cornerstones for electrical and computer engineering (ECE) students. The goal is to motivate and enrich the learning experience in a fundamental ECE course, Circuits, by connecting its topics to relevant and compelling challenges; while simultaneously introducing students to underlying systems-thinking principles.The effort is designing a systems-centric educational model for electrical and computing engineering courses in the context of developing electronic solutions for applied problems. The project focus is on three broad areas of health, energy, and environment, all of which are of great importance and provide students with engaging, relevant application arenas. Prototype learning modules are being developed for use in Circuits courses to increase student interest and improve their ability to think in terms of complex systems.BROADER SIGNIFICANCEThe multi-university partnership brings expertise in multiple disciplines of electrical engineering. The project team has prior experience in offering this systems-centric approach and producing positive results in a wireless sensor network design curriculum. This effort allows the team to extend and further test this promising approach at a lower academic level in another course area, which can lead to a model that can be scaled. The five institutions involved in the project are coordinating and implementing the effort across a diverse set of engineering student populations and locations, thus offering the potential for broad exposure and impact. The project is creating a model for how to develop engineering course material that can be adapted for use by a wide range of universities that are not limited by geographical constraints.