Training Engineering Upperclassmen To Facilitate Freshman Design Teams

As part of a comprehensive effort to redesign the freshman basic engineering curriculum, members of the College of Engineering at the University of Tennessee are utilizing design teams in first year engineering courses. Industry representatives and faculty who teach engineering design have suggested that freshmen in engineering could benefit from early exposure to a team based design component. 1 2 60 freshman students were divided into twelve design teams to work on five design problems over the course of the semester. However, there was some concern about the teamwork skill level of the average entering freshman. It was decided that one way to help build the teamwork skills necessary to complete the problems would be to place a group facilitator with each design team.