A Junior-level EE Projects Course with ABET Rubrics

All electrical and computer engineering majors at the University of Evansville are required to complete EE 380, a 2-hour projects course at the end of the junior year, prior to enrolling in the senior project sequence. This course requires that all students complete four open-ended projects, one of which must be a team project. The team project is typically completed by all of the students in the class in teams of 3 or 4 students each. The remaining three projects must be done on an individual basis and can be chosen from a list of projects in three different areas such as electronics, linear systems, digital systems, electromagnetics, software, etc. EE 380 meets once a week in a session where the instructor provides guidance and coordinates the course. The instructor is also available in the lab at arranged times to provide one-on-one assistance with a project. Students keep a notebook of their work on the projects and turn in a formal report documenting each project. Students must also present a demonstration of each final project to the instructor. As it is structured, this course provides a mechanism to assess ABET outcomes b, d, e, and h. In this paper, we present the logistics of the course, a sample of projects completed, and the course assessment for ABET outcomes.