Engineering Now .: Volume 3 - Edition 9 .: April 2007

First-Year Engineering Students Play Teacher at ES050 Design Showcase

By Audrey Korol

While most Western students were cramming for final exams on Tuesday, April 10, first-year Engineering students were busy showcasing their interactive designs at the annual ES050 Design Showcase.

Each year, students from the ES050 Introductory Engineering Design and Innovation Studio course are given a unique design challenge. The goal of the project is to apply problem-solving skills and innovative thinking strategies to a real-world situation.

“This year, our class was asked to develop teaching aid designs for Ontario Elementary or Secondary Science and Technology students,” explains first-year student, Robyn Hicock. “We were put into small groups in January and assigned to come up with designs to help young students gain a better grasp of concepts in Science and Technology.”

First-year student Colin Gerber’s team created a unique design geared toward helping grade 10-12 students understand concepts in computer science. Gerber’s team developed the unique wooden design, Marble Adder, which performs arithmetic on two binary digits using marbles.

“This project was quite the undertaking because it involved numerous phases: a research stage, concepts stage, design stage and a building stage,” explains Gerber. “My team went through many different design options before deciding on this final prototype.”

For Gerber, the best part of the extensive project was actually building his team’s design during the last two weeks. “It was very rewarding to finally see the whole project come together,” he says.

A total of 68 designs were showcased in the Great Hall. During the event, the public was encouraged to vote for the best overall project. The top design was awards went to the following teams:
PowerBloks!
Professor Paul Kurowksi, Section 010
Team members: Kristin Bubnowicz, Charles Dusastre, Matt Logan, Ariana Markle

The Magneto 2000
Professor Paul Kurowski, Section 010
Team members: Eric Kianfar, Rosalyn Kingsmill, Adam Pidskalny, Foroud Ratsi, Sheraz Salam Mustafa

Magnetism/Maglev Train
Professor Jon Southen, Section 014
Team members: Aaron Hart, Lydia Comley, Sarah Mulder, Nick Serratore, David Vickers

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Contact

.: Allison Stevenson
Spencer Engineering Building, Room 2074
Telephone: (519) 850-2917 Fax: (519) 661-3808
contactwe@eng.uwo.ca