Way forward for engineering degrees? 3

[GregLocock]

Olin college focusses on teamwork for its engienering students

Re-engineering Engineering
By JOHN SCHWARTZ
Published: September 30, 2007
In an era when software matters more than steel, Olin College wants to produce technologists with soul.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/30/m...2f&ei=5124&partner=permalink&exprod=permalink

or possibly

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/30/magazine/30OLIN-t.html?_r=2&ref=magazine&oref=slogin&oref=slogin

"the focus is on learning how to learn, than with a standard engineering curriculum. “How can you possibly provide everything they need in their knapsack of education to sustain them in their 40-year career?” "

Well that's a pretty hilarious soundbite, I can't remember being told how to design suspensions (or do Hamiltonians) at uni.

Anyway, it looks as though they may be ABET accredited, so, while they are all holding hands and emulating Mythbusters, which part of a normal engineering curriculum did they abandon?





Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[graybeach]

All I could say after I read the first paragraph of the Times Magazine article was, "Ouch." I do hope that it was just the article's author making generalizations and that Olin College actually does teach calculus and physics.

 

[zdas04]

I just read the whole article, and if they have any classroom studies it isn't clear. ABET is under a lot of pressure to be "relevant", so maybe the fact that the faculty has a good reputation was all that was required. They didn't talk about an engineering library either--maybe the

http://WWW has

made that irrelevant as well.

This is scary stuff. I keep thinking of several Sci Fi books from the '60s that portray a far distant future where no new machines have been created for hundreds of generations and the maintenance of existing machines has become a religion. I think Olin may be the first step down that road.

David

 

[csd72]

I think it sounds good, but there is so much to learn as a gradueate engineer that learning less will not be in your favor.

I agree that the most important thing is to learn how to learn.

But will it make you think less like an engineer?

 

[DMcGrath]

I solve problems at work on an (almost) daily basis, but it sure helps to have some solid background in soil mechanics or hydraulics sometimes. Civil engineering may not be cool and sexy like software engineering, but somebody's gotta do it. Of the recent graduates I've sat in on interviews with, I'm not sure of the relevance of their non-BSCE undergrad degree coupled with a masters in civil engineering. They want to save the world right out of school. Sounds like a job for the Peace Corps would be a better fit.

 

[livingston]

This is a bit disturbing. It seems that they have jumped straight to the junior or senior project without any technical knowledge to support them. What do they do....say 'let's try this' and just wait to see what happens?

 

[Comcokid]

Strange article. The arguments of the first paragraph are perfect examples of bad management, but it makes it out to be an (engineering) "professional deficiency".

Sounds like to me they're tring to make up for modern generation who have never experienced elector-sets, chemistry sets, tinker-toys, balsa airplanes, and Heathkits as pre-teens.

A better solution would be to require a minimum 1 semester internship working at a engineering company. The co-op programs currently in place at universities require almost as long-term a commitment as ROTC making them unsuitable for the college-plans of most students.

 

[Qshake]

Just a comment on the projects aspect of things...that's find when you're building stuff from courses like Staics and Dynamics but this becomes very impractical for matters of real practical concerns such as structures or energy facilities or hydraulic features such as locks and dams.

So what do we do, well we use models and I suspec that they'll have to do that too (or do without). And if that's true then they'll have to come up with some modelling rules and rules of scale but that requires math and pretty soon before you know it, we're right back where started.

Quite honestly, my old under grad school has a course of study called Engineering Management and it's filled with wanna be engineers whose primary purpose is to say 'I want this and I want it now and at no additioanl cost'.



Regards,
Qshake

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[Twoballcane]

“it comes out that some of the engineers involved knew something was wrong. But too few spoke up or pushed back — and those who did were ignored. This professional deficiency is something the new, tuition-free Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering wants to fix.”

WHAT! I think they are picking on the wrong people. I think it was management who made the final say on what can go and not go on some of these unfortunate cases. Some times the people who make these decisions are not even engineers. They should focus on making the programs in the business colleges respect engineers and their data than the final cost of the project. It is company / business who strive for the low cost. In some companies they have a thing called Cost as an Independent Variable where instead of going for something with some margin, the lowest cost gets the final decision, and then when it blows up in our face, media blames the engineers instead of the mangers who went for cost and schedule than a safe robust design.

Give me a break!


Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."

 

[SylvestreW]

"WHAT! I think they are picking on the wrong people. I think it was management who made the final say on what can go and not go on some of these unfortunate cases. Some times the people who make these decisions are not even engineers. They should focus on making the programs in the business colleges respect engineers and their data than the final cost of the project."

I see it from a different perspective. I think the article/school is right - engineers don't push hard enough (even though they are right and can prove it). You say that schools should teach the business students? I disagree. It's not that they should be re-taught, it's that engineers should educate the managers, but standing firm.

Engineers shouldn't cave and let the managers have the final say. Engineers should take the lead and make the decisions.

At the end of the day, respect is earned, and it's up to engineers to demand the respect, not hope for it. I realize it's almost wishful thinking, but it's definitely something to strive for.

-
Aercoustics.com

 

[csd72]

SylvestreW,

I disagree, managers dont know how to respect us engineers because they dont understand what we do.

csd

 

[Twoballcane]

I may have come off a little vexed, but I have experienced this in the past. Actually let me give an example maybe people in the defense sector can resonate with me. In defense, there is a movement to start using Commercial Off The Shelf Electronics (COTS).

From executive management point of view this is great, we can use the latest technology, its cheap (compare to militarizing it), and the schedule can move faster since it is manufactured by commercial companies. I would agree with this, if we fought our wars in a nice environmentally controlled lab with no dynamics going on, but we are not. Some of the requirements that we have to face up to are huge swings of temperature (-50 to 150 degF), shocks up to 50gs, random vibes that are outrages, humidity where your body temp is the dew point, … etc. I may be exaggerating, but this is the type of world we design too.

I have warned; I showed my analysis; I went into meetings to protest against using COTS stuff. All it takes is somebody to say it is cheaper and easily available to get management to sign up to the equipment. Flash forward six months later at a testing site, chips are popping off, condensation on the CCA’s, screws coming loose and falling onto live circuit boards, brackets snapping, and last but not least, found out that half of the electronics used 100% tin solder. We had to shut down the program for another six months to figure out how to “mitigate” the “situation”, ended up rebuilding the boards, chasses, connectors, to make long story short, we ended up re-design everything to military spec. At the end the product finally past and now it is in the field.

My point is management, especially non-engineering people, make the final decisions. Why do we have to correct our behavior when somebody else makes the final decisions? We know what is ethical and not ethical.

So let the engineers do what they do best. When the engineers send up a red flag, take it seriously and don’t try to find a cheap work around, because it will only nip you in the butt later.


Tobalcane
"If you avoid failure, you also avoid success."

 

[KENAT]

Hear Hear Twoballcane

While it may not happen as much in construction due to the need for PE stamp etc. In other industries it is possible for the Engineers position to be overridden by management, especially non technical management. Be it Bean Counters or whoever.

I once had to have a knock down drag out with a project leader from marketing (also a Chartered Engineer) who wanted to change the color of a product to make it cheaper. Trouble was the product was an aircraft store with low explosive content so the color has a meaning defined by international agreement. Any emergency personel, not just military, will use this color to help assess the situation if one is found where it shouldn't be.

As it was a safety concern I stuck to my guns and eventually got my way, senior management were eventually won over based on the safety impact.

Had it been something not directly safety critical, I probably would have been overridden and if I'd protested further may have faced the consequence.

KENAT, probably the least qualified checker you'll ever meet...

 

[EddyC]

I'm not sure that I'd want to be part of an organization whose leader (Mr Miller) thinks that engineers are social misfits. Someone who has such a poor view of his fellow engineers is someone I wish to avoid.

 

[minerk]

"the project that was given to her and her fellow students: build a robot that can climb a wall. When it worked, she said, 'it was the moment of realization that I could do anything.'"

Are they training engineers or tinkerers? An engineer shouldn't be surprised WHEN it works...

 

[HgTX]

These aren't engineers, they're students. Students are still allowed moments of wonder when the equations turn out to be real.

Hg, still getting over hydraulic leap

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[dcasto]

What Olin will produce are Project Managers and not Project Engineers. Aw, a project manager knows the who, what, when, where, but does not know WHY. Try to manage anything without the WHY answered. Heck a BA liberal arts can tell you can not do without all of these. Sure, you don't have to prove motive in a murder case, but try to complete the evidence gathering without one.

The old saying, there is no I in TEAM is politically correct, but do you think we'd ever gotten anywhere technology wise if everything was made by a committee. It takes an individule to say, there is a design flaw on the leevees, not a group of people all asking Who's gonna supply the labor and money, what's my budget and when must it be built, where does it go, and how will I get paid.

 

[EddyC]

Olin is merely engaging in a sales & marketing ploy to make themselves more attractive than traditional engineering schools.

 

[sctechserv]

I think this is a great approach to an engineering curriculum. Im not sure that he is saying to abondon traditional fundamentals that every engineer needs. I think he is trying to foster real world engineering approaches.
I really like the quote about the job doesnt give you a well defined problem set, its going to be badly defined. The other quote about focus on doing the thing right not doing the right thing.
I agree you cant be bold without doing your homework and basing this on sound judgement.
I think the approach is to deal with the real world and everything doesnt work out in the real world the same as paper and models.
Great provoking article.

 

[msquared48]

"Engineering schools had structured themselves, largely for the convenience of faculty, around a comfortable way of teaching but not the best methods of learning. There was too much note-taking in the classroom and not enough hands-on learning. Institutions stressed research over undergraduate teaching, because that’s where the recognition and grant money come from."

You know, when I entered my first engineering firm back in 1978, my first problem was to analyze what had to be done for a new hold in a concrete shear wall. A what????

I had been in college for 6 years, including grad school, and there was never any mention of a shear wall, let alone the UBC of the time. That was pathetic from an education curriculum standpoint.

I cannot say that I fully agree with the quoted comment above, but, considering what I observed, maybe it is more true than not.

Mike McCann
McCann Engineering