Engineering Education Through Robotics at the United States Air Force Academy

Abstract

Abstract This paper discusses the use of robotics in the electrical and computer engineering curricula at the United States Air Force Academy. One of our important educational goals is to endow graduates with engineering fundamentals and the important hardware and softwaze engineering skills associated with designing, programming, constructing, debugging, and testing complex systems. To support this goal, we embed multiple opportunities into the curricula for students to learn and practice the requisite skills, gradually increasing the complexity as students advance in their respective programs. Robots play a vital role in providing such opportunities to our students. Collectively, robotics is incorporated into our curriculaz at two levels. At the fundamentals level, we use robots to teach basic concepts such as digital logic, analog-to-digital conversion, digital-to-analog conversion, programming, and power management. These concepts then form the basis for the development of more advanced skills such as...