Turning Students On to Circuits

Today's students can be turned on to circuits if the first lab they take is exciting and motivating. We have outlined an approach to achieving this. In addition to illustrating the many concepts taught in theory courses, this approach couples experiments to applications, and encourages students to tinker and explore. We find that a proper mix of the modern and classical approaches produces excellent results. The most unambiguous indication of success for us has been seeing the students' faces light up when their designs work for the first time, and hearing them say that this lab made them realize that EE is for them. Motivating students in this way is especially important in view of the recent trend toward decreasing EE enrollments.