2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Senior Design capstone programs are intended to help students develop engineering knowledge and talent that they can successfully apply after leaving academia. These programs are typically project-based courses where student teams work to address customer provided problems and develop real working solutions. As a result of collaboration between an industry-based instructor and an academic-based instructor, the 2022-23 University of Denver senior design program was refreshed to address two reoccurring themes hindering previous student cohorts:
(1) The academic vs. post-academic student mindset: Up until their capstone design experience, students practice an academic mindset and trust that the instructor-chosen cadence for deliverables will get them to the finish line. During the capstone design experience, some students take full advantage of the course and use it as an opportunity to practice a post-academic mindset, leaving behind the notion that the instructor knows the answer. Other students perceive capstone as the final course requirement on the path towards earning a degree and are essentially “stuck” in the academic mindset.
(2) The disconnect between the design process and documentation: For many students, senior design becomes the highlight of their educational journey apart from one major complaint - the administrative paperwork and documentation required. It seems to catch them off guard and is perceived as additional unnecessary busy work. In the post-academic world, it is well understood that a big component of any engineer’s work is documentation. However, students in courses struggle to understand its importance and/or relevance. If student perception of documentation and the design process is disjointed and incohesive, it becomes difficult for instructors to support student development of a post-academic mindset.
The class was restructured as an imaginary firm where the instructors acted as the CEOs and the students acted as the associates. The firm introduced 3 pillars of operation to reinforce the three dimensions of project delivery: Project Management, Design Control, and Risk Management. The pillars were scaffolded throughout the course’s content to create organization and relevance for the “associates” based on these three dimensions.

The authors hypothesize that the degree to which a student's perception of the usefulness of the 3 pillars of operation is linked to their degree of post-academic mindset. To address this hypothesis, the authors polled this year’s capstone students to assess whether they: (1) perceive senior design as a course or a project; (2) perceive the 3 pillars of operation as useful/relevant to the capstone course; (2) perceive the 3 pillars of operation as useful/relevant to their future career; and (4) feel confident that senior design will prepare them to be a working engineering when they graduate.