The development of a multi-course project for engineering technology students

Summary form only given. Engineering technology programs are beginning to face some of the same issues as engineering programs with new accreditation standards pending and pressure increasing to create integrated, student-centered curricula with better assessment tools. In addition, there is always the challenge of getting students to view their education as a complete package instead of a set of unrelated material that can be quickly forgotten as soon as the course has ended. In order to address these issues, the Engineering Technology Department at Western Washington University (USA) is developing a student portfolio project for students in their freshman and sophomore years. Student portfolios are listed as possible assessment tools in the proposed TAG-ABET criteria for accrediting engineering technology programs, and it is the author's belief that they will prove to be better for judging the strengths and weaknesses of curricula than current methods. The goal is to have students work on the same design project over each quarter of their first two years, further developing their projects as they acquire more knowledge and skills in each class. Students will then present their project portfolios for review at the end of their sophomore year. He believes that the multi-course project will reinforce concepts while requiring students to continue to use skills they have developed in previous courses. This will provide students with a more coherent and cohesive view of their education.