Enhancing Undergraduate Bioengineering Education through Engaged Service Learning, Clinical Immersion, and Entrepreneurship

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Abstract The unique characteristics of the training needed for today’s biomedical engineers to face complex and cross- disciplinary problems impart difficulties in curriculum design. The need to accommodate a sufficiently strong background in foundational science and engineering as well as the diverse areas of biomedical engineering often results in a full set of technically-heavy didactic courses with little opportunity for experiential training prior to the capstone senior design course. As a result of the lack of practical experience, biomedical engineering graduates entering the workforce may struggle due to under-developed soft skills, critical thinking, or the clinical mindset needed to succeed in a professional biomedical team setting. To address this need, we propose to enhance our curriculum by facilitating earlier exposure to hands-on team based design and experiential learning in clinical and industry relevant practice. We will specifically implement new components of a team service-learning design course at the sophomore level, a summer clinical immersion program with local hospitals and emergency medical services at the junior level, and a team-centered workshop led by local industry experts on the translation and commercialization of medical devices to augment the senior design experience. Providing students with needs- based service-learning design projects will prepare them in developing technologies that will not only address public health concerns but also be welcomed by the community and enhance their understanding of the importance of engineering in service to society. Building upon this through new partnerships in the proposed program for clinical immersion, students will gain proficiency in identifying and evaluating unmet clinical needs as well as gain meaningful perspectives related to human factors and expectations for design of a quality medical device. Students will also benefit from a design team-centered workshop series that will be led by local industry experts through activities that will improve their understanding of the industry-relevant practices for development, and how to navigate the regulatory approval processes to translate and commercialize their senior design technologies. Through this three-tiered enhancement to our program that takes students through the complete progression from needs finding to commercialization, students will gain the practical experience early on and repeatedly throughout their undergraduate studies. By strengthen their skills spanning engineering, medicine, and business this program will help our graduates meet the needs of the biomedical workforce and serve as the next generation of entrepreneurs in the biomedical industry.