Franklin W. Olin College and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have announced a Summit on the Engineer of the Future 2.0 (EOTF2.0) to be held 31 March to 1 April 2009 (Tuesday evening to Wednesday) at Franklin W. Olin College in Needham, MA. More information on the event is available at http://engineerofthefuture.olin.edu. The first EOTF was held at Illinois in September 2007 and featured talks by Bill Wulf (NAE) and Sherra Kerns (Olin College). Videos of those talks and more information about that event are available here.
Goldberg, D. E. (2006). Secondary field renaming and enhancement (IESE whitepaper 06003). IESE Department, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL. Download PDFhere
In a world where advanced knowledge is widespread and low-cost labor is readily available, U.S. advantages in the marketplace and in science and technology have begun to erode. A comprehensive and coordinated federal effort is urgently needed to bolster U.S. competitiveness and pre-eminence in these areas. This congressionally requested report by a pre-eminent committee makes four recommendations along with 20 implementation actions that federal policy-makers should take to create high-quality jobs and focus new science and technology efforts on meeting the nation’s needs, especially in the area of clean, affordable energy.
For more infomation please visit the National Academies Press website (here).
Goldberg, D. E. (1994). Engineering for businessfolks. Unpublished manuscript prepared for technology and management program. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL. Download pdfhere
Wednesday 29 April, 4:00 p.m., 301 Coordinated Science Lab (CSL)
Professor Tim Stelzer, Department of Physics
Abstract: The Department of Physics at the University of Illinois has a long tradition of innovation in undergraduate education. From PLATO (the first computer based learning system) to Tycho (web-based homework employing the Socratic method), to Peer Instruction with i>clickers, we have continually led the development and implementation of the best instructional practices for large-enrollement introductory physics courses. The tradition continues with our most recent innovation— prelectures. These short (<20-min) narrated Flash(r) animations are designed to introduce students to the fundamental concepts before they attend lecture, so they are better prepared to participate and learn in lecture. In addition to screening a typical prelecture, results from our published clinical studies, eyetracking studies, and student outcome data from the use of prelectures in our introductory E&M course will be presented.
Timothy Stelzer received his bachelor’s degree in physics from St. John’s University in 1988, and his Ph.D. in physics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1993. A high-energy particle theorist, Professor Stelzer has concentrated on standard model physics at hadron colliders. He has written extensively on top-quark physics and radiation in top events. In addition, he has developed computational methods that have dramatically reduced the difficulty of performing complex cross section calculations. He is the primary author of MadGraph®, a software program that automatically generates the Feynman diagrams and helicity amplitude code for tree-level standard model processes. Most recently, he has been working on a new program to predict how often rare new particles would be produced and also what signatures would distinguish these new particles from the large background of particles already known. He has developed a novel multi-channel approach that efficiently integrates any scattering amplitude to obtain the cross section of any desired process.
Professor Stelzer has also been heavily involved with the Physics Education Group at Illinois, where he has led the development and implementation of tools for assessing the effectiveness of educational innovations in introductory courses and expanding the use of web technology in physics pedagogy. He was instrumental in the development of the I-clicker™ and is a regular on the University’s “Incomplete List of Teachers Ranked as Excellent by Their Students.”
Monday 13 April, 4:00 p.m., 1000 Micro and Nanotechnology Lab (MNTL)
Sheri D. Sheppard, Professor—Mechanical Engineering, Stanford University, and Consulting Scholar—Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching
Abstract: A recently published Carnegie Foundation study of engineering education describes and analyzes both typical and exemplary approaches to teaching and learning engineering at the outset of the new century.It addresses the major questions of what engineering education looks like and how it prepares practitioners by exploring what lies inside the “black box” of preparation for the engineering profession.These questions are addressed in ways that will assist educators, students, university leaders, and practicing engineers to prepare future engineers more effectively.The study also provides an important point of linkage to foster an exchange of insights and best practices among and between disciplinary fields, and both graduate and undergraduate programs.
Educating Engineers: Designing for the Future of the Field is the final report from the Foundation’s study. As the Senior Scholar at the Foundation and lead author of the report, Professor Sheppard will describe the dominant model of engineering education, outline improvements to better align educational practices with the needs to today’s engineering professionals, and propose an alternate (and fairly radical) model suggested by new understanding of how people learn.Ample time will be allotted in the session for Q&A, and discussion.
Sheri D. Sheppard, Ph.D., P.E., is the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching Consulting Senior Scholar principally responsible for the Preparations for the Professions Program (PPP) engineering study, the results of which are in the report Educating Engineers: Designing for the Future of the Field.In addition, she is professor of Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University.Besides teaching both undergraduate and graduate design-related classes at Stanford University, she conducts research on weld and solder-connect fatigue and impact failures, fracture mechanics, and applied finite element analysis.In 2003 Dr. Sheppard was named co-principal investigator on a National Science Foundation (NSF) grant to form the Center for the Advancement of Engineering Education (CAEE), along with faculty at the University of Washington, Colorado School of Mines, and Howard University.She was co-principal investigator with Professor Larry Leifer on a multi-university NSF grant that was critically looking at engineering undergraduate curriculum (Synthesis); one of her key contributions in Synthesis was the development of a pedagogy called mechanical dissection.
Sheri served as co-director of Stanford’s Learning Lab (1997-1999), was Chair of Stanford’s Faculty Senate in 2006-2007, and since September of 2008 has served as Associate Vice provost of Graduate Education.For the last ten years she has been the faculty advisor to the Stanford graduate student group MEWomen.
Sheri is a fellow of the American Society of Mechanical Engineering (ASME), the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), and the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE). She was awarded the 2004 ASEE Chester F. Carlson Award in recognition of distinguished accomplishments in engineering education, and the 2005 ASEE Wickenden Best Journal of Engineering Education Paper Award. Before coming to Stanford University, she held several positions in the automotive industry, including senior research engineer at Ford Motor Company’s Scientific Research Lab.Dr. Sheppard’s graduate work was done at the University of Michigan.
Sheppard’s co-authors on Educating Engineers: Designing for the Future of the Field are Kelley Macatangay, Anne Colby and William Sullivan.
Goldberg, D. E. (2006). The times they are a changin’ (IESE whitepaper 06001). IESE Department, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL. Download PDFhere
Goldberg, D. E. (2006). Human artifacts, phenomena, and interaction themes in the IESE curriculum (IESE whitepaper 06002). IESE Department, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, IL. Download PDFhere
This earnest guide to career transition periods asserts, reassuringly, that navigating the all-important first 90 days is a “teachable skill.” Business professor Watkins lays out a “standard framework” for leadership transitions, based on “five fundamental propositions,” “ten key challenges,” and a four-fold typology of situations that new managers find themselves in.
The First 90 Days can be purchased here. Other readings that inspire innovation in engineering education are listed here.
5:05 iFoundry, the Illinois Foundry for Innovation in Engineering Education, reflects on the journey of it's students throughout their first year at the Un...
