MENU
  • ASEE Logo
  • Give
    Give
    ASEE Donations...
    Classified Volunteer
    Login Join
  • Join Login Volunteer Classified Give
    Give
    ASEE Donations...



About
  • Overview
    • Mission, Vision, Goals
    • Public Policy Statements
    • Constitution
    • Bylaws
    • Organizational Structure
    • Investment Policy
    • Financial Policy
  • Our History
  • Staff Contacts
  • Leadership
    • Board Of Directors
    • Academy Of Fellows
    • Past Board Members
    • Advisory Committees
    • Representatives to External Organizations
    • Executive Director's Message
    • Meeting Minutes
  • Volunteer
  • Careers at ASEE
  • Privacy Statement
I Am A...
  • Member
      Login Required
    • Your Member Page
    • Membership Directory
    • Financials
    • No Login Required
    • Awards
    • Divisions, Fellows, and Campus Reps
    • Sections and Zones
    • Resources
  • Prospective Individual/Organizational Member
    • About ASEE
    • Individual Membership
    • Institutional Membership
    • Major Activities
  • Donor
  • Prospective Partner or Sponsor
  • Advertiser
  • Fellowship Seeker
    • About Fellowships
    • High School
    • Undergraduate
    • Graduate
    • Post-Doctoral
    • Other Programs
Events
  • Conferences and Meetings
    • 2021 Annual Conference & Exposition
    • 2020 Virtual Annual Conference & Exposition
    • Section & Zone Meetings
  • Council Events
    • Conference for Industry and
      Education Collaboration (CIEC)
    • CMC Workforce Summit
    • Engineering Deans Institute (EDI)
    • Research Leadership Institute (RLI) (Formerly ERC)
    • Engineering Technology Leaders Institute (ETLI)
    • EDC Public Policy Colloquium (PPC)
  • Featured Events
    • Frontiers in Education
    • NETI
    • CoNECD
    • First Year Engineering Experience
    • Workforce Summit
  • Future Conference Dates
Publications
  • News
    • Newsletters
    • eGFI
    • Division Publications
  • Journals and Conference Papers
    • Overview
    • Journal of Engineering Education
    • Advances in Engineering Education
    • Conference Proceedings
    • Section Proceedings
    • Zone Proceedings
    • PEER
    • Plagiarism
  • Monographs and Reports
  • Prism Magazine
  • Data
    • Profiles of E&ET Colleges
    • Case Study Series: Engineering-Enhanced Liberal Education
Impact
  • Public Policy Statements
  • Data Analysis
  • Annual Reports
  • Diversity
Education & Careers
  • Academic Job Opportunities
  • Course Catalog
  • Engineering Education Research and Innovation
    • Engineering Education Community Resource
  • PreK-12
    • eGFI Teachers
    • eGFI Students
  • Engineering Teacher PD Endorsement
Calendar
2020 Annual Conference
The ASEE 2020 Virtual Annual Conference content is available.
See More....
  • International Forum
    • Past Forums
  • 2020 Research Leadership Institute(RLI) (Formerly ERC)
    • Overview
    • Registration
    • Housing
    • Program Schedule
    • ERC Past Conferences
  • 2018 Engineering Technology Leaders Institute (ETLI)
    • Engineering Technology Leaders Institute (ETLI)
    • Registration
    • Housing
    • Program Schedule
    • ETLI Sponsorship Options
  • 2017 Global Colloquium
  • Pre K-12 Workshop
    • Call for Proposals
    • Registration
    • Housing
    • Sponsors
    • Program Schedule
    • Past Conferences
  • STEP Grantees Meeting
  • Annual Conference
    • Past Conferences
  • International Forum
    • Past Forums
  • 2020 Research Leadership Institute(RLI) (Formerly ERC)
    • Overview
    • Registration
    • Housing
    • Program Schedule
    • ERC Past Conferences
  • 2018 Engineering Technology Leaders Institute (ETLI)
    • Engineering Technology Leaders Institute (ETLI)
    • Registration
    • Housing
    • Program Schedule
    • ETLI Sponsorship Options
  • 2017 Global Colloquium
  • Pre K-12 Workshop
    • Call for Proposals
    • Registration
    • Housing
    • Sponsors
    • Program Schedule
    • Past Conferences
  • STEP Grantees Meeting
  • Annual Conference
    • Past Conferences

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

The Contribution of Capstone Projects in Green/Renewable Energy Areas to Growth of the Engineering Curriculum in Global Sustainable Development

Presented at Integrated Activities for Green Energy and Manufacturing Education

The Contribution of Capstone Projects in Green / Renewable Energy Areas to Growth of the Engineering Curriculum in Global Sustainable Development

Abstract
The current global considerations regarding sustainable energy use and generation combined with the need of a well-rounded and skilled workforce able to serve a global sustainable industry leads inevitably to new trends and strategic areas in engineering education fields. Our task as educators in the engineering realm is to prepare students to be more effective in a global context as well as to be able to respond to today’s challenges, giving them the essential competencies for global engineering work.

Our Engineering Technology program offers a combined electrical and mechanical engineering technology major, filling in the gap between the industry demand and the current educational majors offerings in the area and nationwide. During past years, responding to global educational and industry demands, our curricula enhanced with several courses related to renewable energy, energy conversion, green energy manufacturing and sustainability. As a result of this enhancement we had an afflux of capstone project topics in the green/renewable energy area reaching a maximum this year when all of our capstone topics are related directly to green and sustainable energy sources or sustainable manufacturing. As a consequence, our curricula moved towards educating students in controversial topics such as global warming, energy security, air pollution, ecological damage, reducing the carbon footprint and green-house emissions. Several new courses have been developed during past two years, further we have taken steps to improve the existing curricula.

The paper aims to present the contribution of several capstone projects developed in the past five years by our students to the growth of the engineering technology curricula in our university. The main aspects presented are related to the integrative approach in green energy harvesting and sustainability, with clear assessment of student-led projects developed during past AYs and how they contributed directly to development of leadership skills along with untamed creativity. While a series of projects are strictly related to energy harvesting, serving as models of energy efficiency and sustainable energy power transmission, others are related to sustainable green energy manufacturing. A technical description of the projects along with clear connections between projects and curriculum development will be described in detail.

Students are continuously and actively involved in self-directed learning to find sustainable solutions to design problems, to recognize that they are part of a global community. Also, these projects served as platforms for course learning modules to enhance existing curricula as well as to develop new courses that ultimately led to a new minor in Green and Sustainable Energy in our department. This paper will present the contribution of all these projects to the new developments, and to building our modern curricula, including assessment, module spin-offs and continuous improvement based on student and faculty feedback.

Authors
  1. Dr. Irina Nicoleta Ciobanescu Husanu Drexel University (Tech.) [biography]

    Irina Ciobanescu Husanu, Ph. D. is Assistant Clinical Professor with Drexel University, Engineering Technology program. Her area of expertise is in thermo-fluid sciences with applications in micro-combustion, fuel cells, green fuels and plasma assisted combustion. She has prior industrial experience in aerospace engineering that encompasses both theoretical analysis and experimental investigations such as designing and testing of propulsion systems including design and development of pilot testing facility, mechanical instrumentation, and industrial applications of aircraft engines. Also, in the past 10 years she gained experience in teaching ME and ET courses in both quality control and quality assurance areas as well as in thermal-fluid, energy conversion and mechanical areas from various levels of instruction and addressed to a broad spectrum of students, from freshmen to seniors, from high school graduates to adult learners. She also has extended experience in curriculum development. Dr Husanu developed laboratory activities for Measurement and Instrumentation course as well as for quality control undergraduate and graduate courses in ET Masters program. Also, she introduced the first experiential activity for Applied Mechanics courses. She is coordinator and advisor for capstone projects for Engineering Technology.

  2. Dr. Yalcin Ertekin Drexel University [biography]

    Dr. Ertekin received his BS degree in mechanical engineering from Istanbul Technical University. He received MS degree in Production Management from Istanbul University. After working for Chrysler Truck Manufacturing Company in Turkey as a project engineer, he received dual MS degrees in engineering management and mechanical engineering from Missouri University of Science and Technology (MS&T), formerly the University of Missouri-Rolla. He worked for Toyota Motor Corporation as a quality assurance engineer for two years and lived in Toyota City, Japan. He received his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from MS&T in 1999 while he worked as a quality engineer for Lumbee Enterprises in St. Louis, Missouri. His first teaching position was at the architectural and manufacturing Sciences department of Western Kentucky University. He was a faculty at Trine University teaching mainly graduate courses as well as undergraduate courses in engineering technology and mechanical engineering departments. He is currently teaching in Engineering Technology Program at Drexel University. His area of expertise is in CAD/CAM, Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machining, rapid prototyping and quality control. His research interest includes sensor based condition monitoring of CNC machining, machine tool accuracy characterization and enhancement, non-invasive surgical tool design, reverse engineering and bio materials.

  3. Dr. Richard Chiou Drexel University [biography]

    Dr. Richard Chiou is Associate Professor within the Engineering Technology Department at Drexel University, Philadelphia, USA. He received his Ph.D. degree in the G.W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. His educational background is in manufacturing with an emphasis on mechatronics. In addition to his many years of industrial experience, he has taught many different engineering and technology courses at undergraduate and graduate levels. His tremendous research experience in manufacturing includes environmentally conscious manufacturing, Internet based robotics, and Web based quality. In the past years, he has been involved in sustainable manufacturing for maximizing energy and material recovery while minimizing environmental impact.

  4. Dr. Michael G. Mauk Drexel University [biography]

    Michael Mauk is Assistant Professor in Drexel University's Engineering Technology program.

Download paper (447 KB)

Are you a researcher? Would you like to cite this paper? Visit the ASEE document repository at peer.asee.org for more tools and easy citations.

» Download paper

« View session

For those interested in:

  • Academia-Industry Connections
  • Advocacy and Policy
  • Broadening Participation in Engineering and Engineering Technology
  • New Members

  • Follow Us
  • twitter
  • facebook
  • youtube
  • instagram
  • linkedin
  • 1818 N Street N.W. Suite 600, Washington DC 20036

  • Telephone: 202.331.3500 | Fax: 202.265.8504

  • © 2021 Copyright: ASEE.org All rights reserved. Privacy Policy.