Student development in the co-curriculum through values-based teaming

A co-curricular multidisciplinary teaming and design center was started in 1997 to augment classical classroom engineering education with active and collaborative project-centered experiential learning. Design, creativity, inventiveness, hands-on learning, project management, teaming, and leadership become the value-added education in the center which now has thirteen teams. Projects such as Formula SAE, Baja SAE, Aero Design etc. are all based on regional, national, and international competitions developed by the engineering societies. The importance of the values of respect, trust, integrity, and responsibility is well known for good teaming and leadership. Values of affection, well-being, skill, understanding, proper use of goods and services and proper use of power and influence are also extremely important. Rucker's continuum of values provides a scale for measurement of these values. Qualitative values assessment as a formative assessment, and placement in the competitions as a summative assessment have been used to measure quality of the teaming, leadership, and general level of the quality of the engineering done by the team. Teams with high values assessments were considered successful and often placed high in their competitions. Teams with low values assessments did not fare well in competitions.