Systems Design Using Real World Experiences With Industry

The author has co-developed and taught the following courses related to systems design at the author's School of Engineering: Senior Design Project (3 semester hr) Manufacturing Related Topics in Probability, Statistics and Reliability (3 semester hr) Senior Design Seminar (1 semester hr) These systems design courses taught in a traditional classroom setting meet ABET criteria. However, by adding the non-traditional elective Applied Systems Design with Industry (3 semester hr) to the systems design curriculum, students have been provided an opportunity for a deeper understanding of the need and benefit for systems design and systems engineering methodology. This paper describes: 1. the perceived shortcomings of a systems design course curriculum in a traditional classroom setting; 2. the development of a non-traditional systems design course with the cooperation of a local industry partner; 3. examples of off-campus field trips to the industry partner that support systems design learning experiences; 4. the outcomes, feedback, and experiences from partnering with a local industry; 5. additional student opportunities resulting from developing a partnership with a local industry. Perceived Shortcomings to Traditional Systems Design Curriculum Before I began a career in academia as a professor of (electrical) engineering, I worked in industry for nearly 20 years. A major part of my career was in the military performing duties as an avionics maintenance technician, a flight crewmember in remote operations in Alaska, an avionics systems engineer for the F-16 aircraft, and researcher for guidance and controls systems in an avionics laboratory. Once in front of the classroom, it did not take long before I noticed that my senior students had a good grasp of the individual subjects (circuits, digital electronics, microprocessors, mathematics, physics, etc.), but they lacked a solid understanding of how the pieces integrated and functioned in a sophisticated system. For example, in a design class, students asked me how an electric motor actually worked. When I described the fundamentals of how a motor worked, I also found myself describing to them how a motor is built piece by piece. How I wished I could take my students back to my roots; to a place where raw materials such as copper and iron are fabricated into individual parts and manufactured and integrated together to make an electric motor. I wanted to take them back with me in the field where I worked and learned hands-on. In my mind, having this real-world knowledge seemed both fundamental and essential to better understand how a motor works. Along with finding a way to provide students with the opportunity to study and understand sophisticated systems, I wanted to involve students in systems design and multidisciplinary teamwork. Again, these are concepts that are best P ge 13135.2 learned about in the field. My solution to providing students with these practical experiences that they cannot get in the traditional classroom environment was by finding a local industry that would be interested in a partnership with the engineering department. Choosing and Selling to the Local Industry Partner Within a ten-mile radius of campus, I searched for an industry that had the best promise of providing systems engineering experience in a manufacturing environment. Several companies met this requirement. I chose to contact a company that was less than five miles from campus, GE Transportation Systems. The local GE facility manufactures diesel freight locomotives. The beauty of this (rail locomotive) system is that it is essentially a large moving power plant that creates electricity to power electric motors, which in turn move the wheels of the locomotive, which in turn pulls or pushes up to a hundred or so rail cars. These freight locomotives are comprised of a variety of systems: diesel engine system, propulsion systems, AC & DC motor systems, cooling systems, traction-control systems, power conversion systems, truck (wheel design) systems, remote monitoring and diagnostics systems, train control systems, rail signaling systems, and wireless communications systems. All these systems are integrated, mounted, and fastened on a system called the “platform.” After a few phone calls, a meeting was set to discuss an academia-industry partnership with engineers and managers from GE. At the meeting I explained to GE that I was looking for a long-term relationship. I wanted to create an opportunity for my students to study systems and the integration and testing of such systems offcampus at their facility. I explained that I wanted my students to have a deeper knowledge and understanding of systems design and integration. In return, what I had to offer was the possibility that some of the students might become interested in their company as a student intern co-op or even become a full-time employee with knowledge in the areas of manufacturing and systems design and integration. There would also be guaranteed opportunities for GE to sponsor students with senior design projects that dealt with systems design. I agreed to be the students’ faculty advisor on all GE-related projects. I also promised to be flexible and adaptive to my industry sponsor’s ever-changing technical business needs.