Highlights From Fall 2018 IE 4340: Engineering Project Management

U T A with star in the center, used when staff photo is unavailable

by Martin Wallace
November 30 2018

Dr. Jaime Cantu’s Engineering Project Management course participated in the Maker Literacies program again for the third consecutive semester. Students were assigned to work collaboratively in teams to manufacture a stuffed animal horse while learning about and implementing project management fundamentals. An integral component of this course is for students to use real-world data to assemble their teams, and aligns perfectly with maker competency 4, “Assembles effective teams” (note that in our-soon-to-be-published revised competencies, this has become competency 9). Dr. Cantu and I have developed an “assembling teams” assignment that facilitates this process. Photos of the fall 2018 student projects are below, but first, I want to point out a couple other exciting highlights.

Earlier in the semester, Dr. Cantu presented a conference paper that we co-authored at the American Society for Engineering Management (ASEM) annual conference. ASEM is a global professional society dedicated to the promotion and advancement of the engineering and technical management profession. Our paper is about the assembling teams assignment, some metrics we developed to measure student success, along with a first glimpse of preliminary data from the Maker Literacies program (with IE 4340 data only). Dr. Cantu reports that of all the papers presented during this session, our paper garnered the most questions and feedback.

Dr. Jaime Cantu presenting at ASEM 2018

Dr. Jaime Cantu presenting at ASEM 2018

In another exciting development, the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) visited UTA to conduct their periodic accreditation review for UTA's BSIE program. The evaluator, Dr. Ed Pines, and Observer, Dr. Terry Collins, spent time with IE faculty & staff, Libraries staff and FabLab staff and noted Dr. Cantu’s Engineering Project Management course “utilizing student teams in the FabLab” as one of two IE noteworthy program strengths. The second was their K-12 outreach program. I and the rest of the Maker Literacies team are humbled by this recognition of our efforts to improve student teamwork competencies through collaborative curriculum design.

Lastly, before getting to the student projects, Dr. Cantu was also nominated for an Innovation in Teaching award. Although he did not receive the award this time, the nomination itself signifies the degree of thought and creativity he has brought to his Project Management course. Congratulations again, Dr. Cantu!

Now, last but not least, some photos of the fall 2018 student projects. This course allows students to develop and manage cross-disciplinary engineering design teams, with topics including: understanding R&D organizations, teams and workgroups, job design, organizational effectiveness, and leadership of technical professionals. This was achieved by student teams using the FabLab to manufacture stuffed animal horses. Some of the project specifications included: eyes must be made from glass, fabric must have some screen-printed element, wood should be used for a diorama/hitching post, and sewing, 3D-printing, milling, and laser cutter/etcher must all be used on at least one part. If not obvious, they also had to sew!  The Libraries and the FabLab are impressed by the final projects, but also by the project management competencies students were able to demonstrate. Look for the horses to be on display at Central Library soon. Great job everyone!

Team 1 Photos

Photo of Team 1's Horse made in the UTA FabLab

Photo of Team 1's Horse made in the UTA FabLab

Photo of Team 1's Horse Close-up

Photo of Team 1's Horse Close-up

Photo of Team 1: Oluwakayode Awolowo, Brad Pipes, Ashton Blackwood, Ololade Mafimidiwo, Rashdan Ahmed

Photo of Team 1: Oluwakayode Awolowo, Brad Pipes, Ashton Blackwood, Ololade Mafimidiwo, Rashdan Ahmed

Team 2 Photos

Photo of Team 2's Horse made in the UTA FabLab

Photo of Team 2's Horse made in the UTA FabLab

Photo of Team 2's Horse Close-up

Photo of Team 2's Horse Close-up

Photo of Team 2: Puja Bhandari, Vanessa Loah, Austin Smith

Photo of Team 2: Puja Bhandari, Vanessa Loah, Austin Smith

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