2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

All first-year students attending the University of Louisville JB Speed School of Engineering are required to take a two-course sequence that is an introduction to engineering. All engineering disciplines are required to take this sequence, and the courses are interdisciplinary. The first course of the sequence is Engineering Methods, Tools, & Practice I (ENGR-110), and it covers basic skills that are fundamental to the engineering profession. The second course is Engineering Methods, Tools, & Practice II (ENGR-111), and it has students expand on the skills learned in ENGR-110. ENGR-111 culminates with a semester-long hands-on cornerstone project. ENGR-111 has traditionally been taught in the university’s 15,000 square foot makerspace. The makerspace has room to break the students into groups (teams) of 3-4 to work on the cornerstone project. Approximately 500 students take ENGR-111 during the spring semester across six sections. There are multiple cornerstone projects that the instructors have used in ENGR-111. The cornerstone projects incorporate many engineering skills such as programming, a basic introduction to circuitry, and teamwork. The cornerstone project is common across all six sections in a given semester, and the instructional team determines the rotation.

The instruction on programming presented in ENGR-111 extends the programming skills learned in ENGR 110. ENGR 110 teaches programming basics in Python, where ENGR-111 uses Arduino microcontrollers for the programming curriculum and cornerstone project. The programming lessons are scaffolded to prepare the students for the end-of-semester cornerstone. Students are exposed to a wide variety of software design concepts to prepare them for their academic and professional careers.

This work in progress paper looks at two semesters of ENGR-111 with the same Cornerstone project with differences in the programming portion of the project. Project 1A took place during the spring semester of 2022 and Project 1B takes place during the spring semester of 2026. The Cornerstone project designation Project 1 is the windmill power generation system. There have been modifications to the system that will be referred to as A or B.

Project 1A’s programming involved receiving input from a proximity sensor connected to a circuit to allow calculations to be performed in the cornerstone code. The students were to calculate and display: RPM, Power Generation, Windmill Blade Efficiency, Motor Efficiency, and Overall Efficiency.

Project 1B’s programming involved everything in 1A and added a motor detachment control. If the wind was too strong their code would control a servomotor to disconnect the DC motor from the windmill. The code would also control the servomotor to reconnect the DC motor when wind speed was below the disconnect threshold.

Project 1B changes were made due to students’ self-reported programming interest from Project 2. Project 2 is a water filtration system for stormwater routing. In Project 2 the students controlled a valve and pump with the Arduino, and the students' programming interest was higher than Project 1A. The instructional team made changes to Project 1B to incorporate visible control to determine if students’ programming interest would increase on Project 1. The spring 2026 students will take a survey to provide their perceptions of the programming instruction as well as self-report their confidence in programming. These results will be compared to the survey results from the last semester that Project 1A was used.