Aircraft Design as a Tool in Achieving Educational Objectives for Engineering Concepts in a Core Curriculum

Abstract

The U.S. Air Force Academy has a Core Curriculum taken by all cadets as they pursue B.S. degrees in various disciplines. The Core includes a series of engineering courses, including: a freshman engineering course, a sophomore engineering mechanics course, and three junior courses (a course in aeronautics, a course in astronautics, and a course in electrical and computer engineering). In addition, all cadets take an introductory course in computing. Typically these courses are overviews of the various engineering disciplines, and are often also taken by students majoring in the disciplines as an introductory course in their major. The course in aeronautics, Fundamentals of Aeronautics (AE315), has traditionally been taught in lecture mode with regular homework assignments and projects, with student assessment taking place using mid-term and final exams. In order to support the Academy Scholars Program, a new version of AE315 was created for students in the Scholars Program, with the Scholars students using a team-based learning approach. In an approach that was inspired by a sophomore aircraft design course developed at Cal Poly, the Scholars version of AE315 has evolved into an aircraft design course, where the students were asked to perform a conceptual design of an historical aircraft: a multi-role fighter for the U.S. Air Force in 1960. The use of aircraft design as a motivation and basis for learning about aeronautics was successful, with many lessons learned and motivation obtained to expand the course in the future.