Optimization from a Working Baseline: A Design Education Approach

Optimization from a working baseline is a design education approach that has been adopted at University of California, San Diego after watching years of students attempt overly ambitious designs under tight time constraints. The end results were often that designs were completed without time for optimization or comparison of theory to hardware performance, and the educational message of good design practice was not being conveyed. There was specific concern that analysis was not being applied in hands on design projects, rather under time pressure students often resorted to an unguided trial-and-error approach. To remedy this situation, we separated our mechanical and aerospace senior design courses into two distinct projects. Our first senior design project uses the working baseline approach, where students use analysis to optimize a reduced degree-of-freedom system. In these projects students gain design and analysis skills that prepare them to tackle more complex design challenges. A second project is then addressed, which includes all of the wonderful complexity and uncertainty that are characteristic of open-ended problems in engineering design.