2026 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

The Evolution of the Metallurgical Engineering Junior Design Course

Presented at Materials Division (MATS) Technical Session 2

The Metallurgical Engineering junior design sequence at South Dakota Mines underwent an evolution that started in 2022 with the advent of an NSF Improving Undergraduate STEM Education (IUSE) grant which supported a new program called Art + Engineering (A+E). The A+E program goal was to integrate creative components into the curriculum to increase innovation and entrepreneurial mindsets within our students.

This paper focuses on the evolution and assessment of the junior design course over a five-year period. The first couple years focused on the indigenous minerals and processing necessary to create simple viable ceramic products from the Black Hills. This was followed by more advanced designs that include metals, minerals, and glass used to create functional instruments. These instruments are played by undergraduate students in the annual musical concert called “The Battle of the Bands”.

In the course, the material and specific design guidance are open-ended. From multiple years of external assessment, the A+E leadership team learned that the student cohorts reported more confidence with the approach to the design process. Beginning in 2024 all design projects centered around musical instruments, not generally an area that engineering students would be comfortable with. Students reported that laboratory and faculty resources were sufficient for the design process. Students uniformly stated that the junior design experience was good preparation for the forthcoming senior design experience and communicated that they gained confidence with the collaborative design process.

Authors

Dr. Katrina J Donovan http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0410-7847 South Dakota Mines [biography]

Dr. Katrina Donovan received her B.S. degree from South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in 2010. She received her Ph.D. in Materials Science from Oregon State University in 2019, studying the microfluidic investigations of capillary flow and surface phenomena in porous polymeric media for 3D printing. She worked for multiple years at HP, Inc. in the 3D Printing Department. She is currently a Lecturer at South Dakota Mines and Research Scientist at Dragon Materials, LLC, an engineering consulting firm. Her research involve experimental design and technique development for soft materials, complex fluids, and surface phenomena. She a wide range of experience in rheological, thermal, structural, and molecular characterization that she leverage fundamentally for academic purposes as well as industrially for applications. As her three patents can show, designing experiments and creating novel techniques to answer fundamental questions that drive applications and technology forward captivates her interest. She has volunteered countless hours to the community, led multiple STEM Education grants that engage the local K-12 schools of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, and has submitted proposals that engage even more tribal communities.
Dr. Jon J Kellar South Dakota Mines [biography]

Kellar is the Douglas Fuerstenau Professor of Materials and Metallurgical Engineering at the SD School of Mines and Technology. He has been on the faculty since 1990, and in 1994 was selected as an National Science Foundation Presidential Faculty Fellow a
Dr. Michael West South Dakota School of Mines and Technology [biography]

Dr. Michael West is an associate professor and head of the department of materials and metallurgical engineering at the South Dakota School of Mines and Technology (SD Mines). Between 2008-2013, he served as site director of the NSF I/UCRC Center for Fri
Dr. Stuart D. Kellogg South Dakota School of Mines and Technology [biography]

Stuart Kellogg is Professor and Head of Industrial Engineering at SDSMT. His discipline research areas of interest include applied probability and stochastic models but his passion over the last two decades rests with STEM Education and STEM Education re
Haley Armstrong South Dakota Mines

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