Of course, when a big name school decides to change something, the whole world sits up and takes notice.
But this is not a new idea. Most schools have hands on practice in lab courses, as well as projects in the last two years of undergrad. If you're looking for something truly unique, try taking at look at Oregon State University and the TekBots
program.
The TekBots program starts during the first year for Electrical and Computer Engineering students, with the construction of a simple robot. This robot is used to relate theories from lecture to real world problems, such as what happens to a motors speed and torque as the voltage and current are changed. Now here's what makes the program unique. Instead of the students seeing the robot for just one course, the robot follows them throughout their years at OSU, so by senior year, the TekBot is very advanced. This allows the professors at OSU to teach topics such as Digital Logic, Signals and Systems, and Computer Architecture in a way that is both real and exciting to the students. Plus, each student owns their own TekBot, giving them the ability to "play" with it at home.
This system has been expanded into Mechanical Enineering and Computer Science as well, giving students in all four disciplines the chance to see the interactions of their feild with others.
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Of course, when a big name school decides to change something, the whole world sits up and takes notice. But this is not a new idea. Most schools have hands on practice in lab courses, as well as projects in the last two years of undergrad. If you're looking for something truly unique, try taking at look at Oregon State University and the TekBots program. The TekBots program starts during the first year for Electrical and Computer Engineering students, with the construction of a simple robot. This robot is used to relate theories from lecture to real world problems, such as what happens to a motors speed and torque as the voltage and current are changed. Now here's what makes the program unique. Instead of the students seeing the robot for just one course, the robot follows them throughout their years at OSU, so by senior year, the TekBot is very advanced. This allows the professors at OSU to teach topics such as Digital Logic, Signals and Systems, and Computer Architecture in a way that is both real and exciting to the students. Plus, each student owns their own TekBot, giving them the ability to "play" with it at home. This system has been expanded into Mechanical Enineering and Computer Science as well, giving students in all four disciplines the chance to see the interactions of their feild with others.