2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Integrating Companies and Higher Education in the Teaching-Learning Process of Lean Thinking Using Challenge-Based Learning

Presented at Industrial Engineering Division (IND) Technical Session 1

Manufacturing companies constantly search for graduates who know more about Lean Manufacturing to reduce waste and improve productivity. This paper presents a model that integrates teaching Lean Thinking in higher education within an organization’s facility using Challenge-Based Learning (CBL). The main objective of the Challenge is to apply Lean Thinking and its tools to improve a Key Performance Indicator (KPI). The model has two main sections: academic and organizational perspectives. While the academic focus is on the curriculum requirements, the challenge, and the evaluation, the organizational perspective covers all the operations management among the university, students, and company. One of the requirements is that the company presents real-world problems for students. The company benefits from CBL by selecting outstanding engineers for future hiring, updating problem-solving tools, and generating innovative ideas to implement Lean Thinking.
We conducted the MUSIC(R) model of motivation to evaluate how motivated a student was during the model and its usefulness. The results suggest that using CBL maintains students' interest in Lean concepts. The model has also shown an acceptable percentage of Lean projects reaching the goal established by the company (63.24\%). The proposed model can be replicated easily; however, the student's motivation results might not be generalized.

Authors

Dr. Araceli Zavala Tecnologico de Monterrey [biography]

Araceli Zavala has worked since 2005 at the Industrial and Systems Engineering department at Tecnologico de Monterrey campus Guadalajara as a full-time professor teaching both undergraduate and graduate courses related to the area of Statistics, Operations Research and Supply Chain mainly. She has been a consultant for several small and big companies in Mexico. Before working as a professor, she worked as General Manager at a textile Distribution Center and as an Operation Manager. She holds a Ph.D. degree in Engineering Management from the Stevens Institute of Technology and a master´s degree in Quality Systems and Productivity from Tecnologico de Monterrey.
Jonathan Cuevas-Ortuño Tecnologico de Monterrey [biography]

Jonathan Cuevas-Ortuño is a full-time professor of the Department of Industrial Engineering at Tecnológico de Monterrey. He holds a Ph.D degree in Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering from CIATEC (CONACYT Public Research Center) and a master´s degree in Quality Systems and Productivity from Tecnológico de Monterrey. Also, he is Industrial and Systems Engineering from Tecnológico de Monterrey. Since August 2003, he has taught courses (undergraduate, graduate and continuing education) and has participated in consulting projects in Lean-Six Sigma, Discrete Event Simulation (DES), Healthcare Engineering and Logistics.
J. Reyes Angulo Cedeño Tecnologico de Monterrey
Agustin Perez Araos Tecnologico de Monterrey
Marco Antonio de Luna [biography]

Marco A. de Luna holds a Ph.D. in Bayesian statistics, Industrial Statistics and Optimization from the Universidad Politecnica de Valencia. He has a master's degree in Quality Systems and Productivity and a master's degree in Industrial Engineering. Since 1994 he has been a professor of the Industrial and Systems Engineering department, teaching topics of Industrial Statistics, Data Science, Simulation, Quality, Six Sigma, Operations Research, Simulation, and Application of System Thinking. For more than 25 years, he has given training courses in different companies and training courses for teachers in topics related to statistics and Six Sigma methodology.

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