Drama: An Emerging Model To Teach Engineering Design And Team Dynamics

Is it possible to design a better team-building model that integrates engineering design and team dynamics? And if so, can such a model improve an instructor’s effectiveness? As educators at the Colorado School of Mines (CSM) who teach design and teamwork to first-year and second-year students, such questions are a primary concern to us. Four factors converged on campus at CSM during the spring semester of 1997 that provided a potential answer: (1) The Student Council for Mines Little Theater (MLT) voted to allow an all-student production team to produce the musical, The Music Man ; (2) two of the three professors involved with the project have extensive backgrounds in theater; (3) one of those two professors happened to be teaching a sophomore level Design (EPICS) course that semester; and (4) the third professor, a design engineer by trade and passionate inclination, auditioned and acted in the production. This article reports the insights we gathered observing this all-student production team in action and, based on these findings, to propose a working model to develop and to teach teams in design, leadership, management and communication.