Non-engineering Students Research Articles

MiniMIPS

We developed the project presented in this paper for an undergraduate computer architecture course specifically aimed at non-engineering students. The project is designed to develop understanding of processor organisation at the functional unit level by building a series software execution driven simulators, from a single cycle sequential processor to a simple pipelined processor. The students are lead through the functional design process step by step, in a succession of carefully structured tasks. The project starts by building functional units of a processor. These units are then used to construct a single cycle processor, a multi cycle processor, and finally a pipelined processor with data hazard detection and forwarding. The main goal of the project is to give students a true insight into the fundamental ideas, which are the basis of the development of the modern microprocessor.

Experiment-based project in undergraduate computer architecture

The project presented in this paper has been developed for an advanced undergraduate computer architecture course specifically aimed at non-engineering students. The project is intended to develop understanding of issues in modern computer architecture through empirical testing and experimentation, using sophisticated execution time simulation and industry standard benchmark programs. The students are lead through the functional design process of a superscalar pipelined processor step by step, in a series of carefully structured experiments. The experiments either provide direct support for the design decisions, or make students explore a specific concept. The main goal of the project is to give students a true insight into the current technology and the driving forces behind modern computer architecture, without the burden of engineering and implementation details.

An Upper Division General Education Course on Materials for Non-Engineering Students

ABSTRACTWe present the structure of a new course which is designed to expose junior and senior level undergraduates in non-engineering fields to materials. Washington State University has a “General Education” requirement, which requires students to take a variety of courses including the area of sciences, humanities, and technology. We have developed this course to satisfy the requirement for technology for upper division students. The results of the enrollment over the past 3 years are presented: each semester more majors are taking the course, suggesting it is reaching an multidisciplinary audience. Comments from the students and plans for the future are discussed.

Teaching engineering ethics to non-engineering students

Because engineering decisions regarding infrastructure and consumer products affect everyone, students enrolled in non-engineering curricula can also benefit from examining issues of engineering ethics. The article explores methodologies and topics for acquainting non-engineering students with engineering ethics, including a short background of a professional ethics course.

Marquette's Engineering Student Volunteer Outreach Program to Fifth Graders in the Public Schools, Choice Schools, and a Charter School in Milwaukee

ABSTRACTEducational efforts by the MSE profession can effect society in several ways: by producing more and better MSE graduates, by enhancing the Materials backgrounds of students from other engineering disciplines, by continuing education programs, and, in a nontraditional sense, by impacting the non-engineering community with outreach programs. I suggest that the effect on society of working with disadvantaged elementary school children, such as inner city fifth graders, is potentially far greater than efforts spent on non-engineering students already in college, high school students, or even middle school students. The Fifth Grade Volunteer Teaching Program (5GVP) at Marquette has attempted over the last ten years to inform Milwaukee's inner city fifth graders of the existence of an engineering career while showing them that science is something that they can actually do themselves and that the doing is fun. Maybe some of the roughly 5,000 students taught have stayed in the college prep track in math and science as a result of contact with our enthusiastic engineering student volunteers. Our lessons are self contained and heavy with things for the fifth graders to do themselves. One lesson, which portends Materials Science and Engineering, is called, “Phases of Matter”. This year I have expanded the 5GVP Program to include three of the Choice Schools operating in Milwaukee. These schools differ from the Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) and from each other significantly. Class sizes in the Choice Schools vary from much smaller than MPS to about the same size as MPS. The school buildings range from ramshackle to very modern. The Charter School has science labs and the Choice Schools do not. The Charter School is for profit and these two Choice Schools are not for profit.

A course in musical acoustics for nonengineering majors at the University of Hartford

The University of Hartford’s College of Engineering provides a service course entitled ‘‘Introduction to Musical and Architectural Acoustics’’ for nonengineering students majoring in such degree programs as music (at the Hartt School), technology fields, or the liberal arts. The material covers: acoustics terminology and concepts; a study of the science of each musical instrument family; sound radiation patterns of instruments and the implications for sound recording technology; the auditory system and hearing conservation; and an introduction to architectural acoustics related to such applications as band room and auditorium design. This presentation will describe some of the multi-media techniques for in-class presentation of the material as a means of better disseminating complex information using a sensory-rich environment. The extent to which this course fits into the assessment goals and general education science requirements of these nonengineering majors will also be discussed.

Statics and Strength of Materials, Second Edition

Abstract The second edition of this book, which comes twelve years after the release of the first, mainly targets engineering technology and non-engineering university students with no calculus requirements, as the author states. However, the book may also serve as a reference for courses in materials and materials testing as well as machine and structural design. Two new chapters have been included in this edition: Concurrent Forces in Space (under the Statics branch) and Bolted, Riveted, and Welded Structural Connections (under the Strength of Materials branch). In addition to many changes and improvements throughout all the chapters of the book, this edition contains three new sections: Power Transmission, Flange Couplings (under the chapter named Shear Stresses and Strains; Torsion), and Design of Beams for Strength (under the chapter named Bending and Shearing Stresses in Beams). However, the new chapter Concurrent Forces in Space seems to be very short (it may be described as the five-example and fourteen-problem chapter) and needs to be critically examined.

A didactic presentation of elementary bond graphs for non-engineering students

Despite the power and simplicity of bond graphs (BG S ), non-engineering students often think of them as “tools for theoreticians”—the notion of junctions just seems too abstract. In this paper a didactic heuristic approach to BGs by topological transformations of networks into hypergraphs and then into BGs is presented. Bonds, junction structures and construction methods are discovered “naturally” and thus are accepted by students. The definition of the relation between hypergraphs and BGs is discussed, and a proof is given inspired by Paynter's use of scattering variables of the sufficiency of 0 and 1 junctions for an energy domain. A Prolog program which deduces simulation routines in a student-oriented, human mimicking way is also briefly discussed.

Components of engineering-English reading ability?

This study explored variables which may contribute to the ability to read engineering English. A test of engineering-English reading comprehension ability and a cloze test of general English language proficiency were administered to four groups of graduate students ( n = 29 for each): (1) American engineers, (2) Americans in TESL, (3) Chinese engineers and (4) Chinese in TEFL. The cloze test had 50 items with a seventh-word deletion pattern. The engineering reading test contained 60 items based on three passages. The results indicated that the engineering reading test significantly ( P <0.01) separated the mean performance of Chinese engineering and non-engineering students—thus supporting previous study of the validity of that measure. In addition, a clear-cut pattern emerged in the mean performances of the four groups which was also further found to exist for each and every one of the ten different item types (including both linguistic and engineering factors) on the engineering test. finally, it appeared that as much as 62 percent of the variation in scores on the engineering reading text was accounted for by general English language proficiency rather than by components specific to engineering English. The discussion includes many questions that arose from these results.

The phoenix-a challenge to engineering education

Engineering education is presented with a unique opportunity for improvement due to the interruption caused by the war. This improvement can only be obtained by a clear determination of the fundamental goals of engineering education and the application to its curricula of the engineering design processes it claims to teach. A distinction should be drawn between the problems of Science, which are those of analysis, and the problems of engineering which are those of Synthesis. Engineering and nonengineering students both should be taught what engineering really is, its philosophy and what it can do. The importance of its humanistic aspect should be stressed. A program is proposed for participation in the discussion and design of engineering curricula by the Institute sections.

Achievement Motivation of Engineering and Nonengineering Students in India

Achievement Motivation of Engineering and Nonengineering Students in India

A New Approach to the Science Requirement for Nonengineering Students

In the Winter Quarter 1972 the Electrical Engineering Department at Ohio State offered a new course for nonengineering students. The course followed the text, The Man Made World, and included a film and guest lecture series. The 25 students who completed the course achieved some appreciation for and facility with quantitative procedures for solving problems and indicated their approval of the course. Adjusting to the wide range in the students' interests and ability, (especially mathematical), and stimulating classroom participation were major difficulties. The course, considered a success, will be offered again in the future on a regular basis, and large enrollments are expected since the course now satisfies the natural science requirement for many students in the University.

Electrical Engineering for Freshmen

A course in electrical engineering for freshmen, suitable for both engineering and non-engineering students, is presented. The course is intended to give the students an overall view of the field, at the same time teaching them enough fundamentals that they will be able to diagnose and develop simple circuits, getting a taste of design. A hydraulic analog is presented for ease and speed in teaching basic electrical concepts. An unconventional teaching technique, the "inclassdrill," is used, with encouraging results.

The Vocational Interests of Engineering and Non-Engineering Students

The Vocational Interests of Engineering and Non-Engineering Students

The Phoenix-A Challenge to Engineering Education

Engineering education is presented with a unique opportunity for improvement due to the interruption caused by the war. This improvement can only be obtained by a clear determination of the fundamental goals of engineering education and the application to its curricula of the engineering design processes it claims to teach. A distinction should be drawn between the problems of Science, which are those of analysis, and the problems of engineering which are those of Synthesis. Engineering and nonengineering students both should be taught what engineering really is, its philosophy and what it can do. The importance of its humanistic aspect should be stressed. A program is proposed for participation in the discussion and design of engineering curricula by the Institute sections.

Mass, Weight, and Dynamical Units

IF the laws of dynamics were made solely for the use of engineers, as a celebrated engineer declared of rivers that they were intended to feed canals, it might be conceded to Prof.Greenhill that it would not be necessary that the more abstract notion of mass should be distinguished from that of weight, and that the fundamental equation of dynamics might conveniently be taken as P=Wf/g, where W is the weight (or mass) of the body moved expressed in pounds or tors &c., and P the force producing in it the acceleration f, and reckoned in the same units. But a pound weight as a force is a variable unit, unless it is taken at some particular place (as Greenwich), and then theorresponding value of g must be employed (though the variation of g on the surface of the earth is not so great as often to need to be taken account of by the engineer); and so the astronomer and physicist, as well as the student of abstract dynamics, are right in demanding a less arbitrary measure of force than one founded on the force acting vertically downwards on a body at the earth's surface, as well as an absolute constant belonging to each body (its mass) independent of time and place. I conceive, therefore, in spite of Prof. Greenhill's arguments, that, in the interest of clearness of thought, as well as to avoid the practical inconvenience of a variable unit of force, the notions of mass and weight must be kept distinct, and the equation W=Mg, as a special case of the general equation P=Mf, still insisted on by all teachers of dynamics, at any rate to non-engineering students; while it would be well for engineers also (me judice) to have their dynamics cast in the same mould as the rest of the scientific world.