Report from the AIAA ASM 2011 Design Education Forum
Prepared by:
Clark Briggs, ATA Engineering and Dolores Krausche, Florida Center for Engineering Education
Final 11/30/2011
Introduction
The Design Education Forum at the 2011 ASM conference was jointly sponsored by the AIAA Academic
Affairs Committee (AAC) and the AIAA Design Engineering Technical Committee (DETC). Titled, “The
Role of Design Experience in Advancing Engineering Education,” the forum was co-hosted by Dolores
Krausche, representing the AAC, and Clark Briggs, DETC chair of the Design Education subcommittee.
The forum featured six invited panelists representing several of AIAA’s technical committees that
support educational activities and university research programs that support significant student
involvement. They included:
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N Sam Dougherty, Jacobs ESTS Group, Thermophysics TC Overview
Aaron Altman, University of Dayton, Applied Aerodynamics TC Overview
Mark Ewing, University of Kansas, describing the Meridian UAV Project as an example of applied
research projects
Gil Crouse, Auburn University, Aircraft Design TC Overview and Design Competitions
Hernando Jimenez, Georgia Tech, Aircraft Design TC, describing the GaTech Aerospace Systems
Design Laboratory
Russ Althof, Raytheon Company, Design Engineering TC and the AIAA Design/Build/Fly
Competition
The Topics
In preparation for the forum, email was distributed to potential ASM attendees in several Technical and
Standing Committees with an interest in design education inviting their participation in a pre-conference
dialogue. The email identified the following topics:
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Are programs providing sufficiently realistic experiences applicable for practice in industry or
research agencies?
Can design be taught? What is your approach? How do you decide what elements should be
included? Have you identified best practices?
What is the role of “build and test” in design education? In particular, how do you conduct
capstone projects, design-build-fly competitions or applied research?
How do we balance design education and curricular activities with teaching project
management, business economics, entrepreneurship and leadership? How does your program
foster innovation?
How can an individual’s progress in design skills be measured? How can the design elements in
programs be best assessed?
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Overview of the Session
The session, “Adapting Curricula: Project Updates and Open Forum in Design Education,” was one of five
organized by Dolores Krausche for AAC’s 2011 Education Program. The five sessions included:
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“Innovations in Instruction and Design Projects” 5 January 2011, #86-EDU-1
“Best Practices in Advancing Aerospace Engineering Education” 5 January 2011, #121-EDU-2
“Software Engineering in Aerospace Engineering Curricula” 6 January 2011, #159-EDU-3
“University Space System Programs” 6 January 2011, #182-EDU-4
“Adapting Curricula: Project Updates and Open Forum in Design Education” 6 January 2011,
#196-EDU-5
Jean Koster and Debbie Mayer opened the session with their progress reports on the North American
Aerospace Project and Project Lead the Way, respectively. The following authors’ abstracts summarize
their presentations.
AIAA-2011-0554, “North American Aerospace Project: Adaptable Design/Build Projects for Aerospace
Education,” E. Crawley; R. J. Niewoehner; J. Koster.
Abstract: The North American Aerospace Project (NAAP) is a NASA/industry sponsored effort to
accelerate penetration of the project-based educational concept of “Conceiving, Designing,
Implementing, and Operating” (CDIO) into US Aerospace Engineering programs. NAAP is
developing innovative educational approaches, tools, methods and concepts specialized for the
education of the future aerospace engineers. Several projects have been made available in a
standardized template format. The template is designed to help an interested faculty member to
quickly adopt a project and introduce it in a class.
AIAA-2011-0555, “Aerospace Engineering in the Classroom: The Project Lead The Way Model,” D.
Mayer; G. Holt; S. Cox.
Abstract: Project Lead The Way (PLTW) is changing the emphasis in classrooms by engaging
middle and high school students with hands-on real-world activities, projects, and problems to
solve. In the process, students learn to apply knowledge that they will retain beyond the test and
integrate academic learning into real life. This teaching methodology is applied to the PLTW
Aerospace Engineering course as part of a Pathway to Engineering (PTE) available to high school
students across the nation.
The Dialogue: Addressing the Topics
As moderator, Clark Briggs introduced the panelists and the agenda that had been developed during the
pre-conference dialogue. What follows is a summary of the presentations and dialogue with the
attending audience.1
Are programs providing sufficiently realistic experiences applicable for practice in industry
or research agencies?
Sam Dougherty provided evidence for a “Yes.” In his presentation, he observed that there has been a
proliferation of projects and opportunities that are sponsored by industry and government agencies as
illustrated by programs supported by Jacobs ESTS Group and NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Participating in projects such as the NASA University Student Launch Initiative, students design, build
1
Additional commentary provided via email is provided in the Appendix of this report.
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and launch reusable rockets capable of delivering a payload to an altitude of approximately five
thousand feet. Students from more than 30 institutions have gained realistic experience by addressing
RFPs, raising funds and learning “insider knowledge” as they work with mentoring sponsors.
Certainly sponsored research programs provide some of the best opportunities for students to obtain
realistic design and project management experience. Mark Ewing described the exemplary Meridian
UAV project, featuring an aerial platform for ice-penetrating radar being conducted by the University of
Kansas’ NSF Center for Remote Sensing at the Ice Sheets. The project team, including current and
former students and faculty, designed and built the 1100-pound aircraft with a 26-foot wingspan from
“scratch.” Operational demonstrations are scheduled to be held in Greenland this summer.
The project has significantly influenced the curriculum providing accessible “live” and “unintended”
realistic case studies for courses such as CAD, instrumentation and testing, materials and processes, and
structures among others. It provides background experience for advanced capstone and competition
projects. Along with his enthusiasm for the ground-breaking research and curricular advancement,
Mark Ewing concluded his presentation with a “word of caution” concerning the sustained effort that is
required to fund and develop such programs.
Can design be taught? What is your approach? How do you decide what elements should be
included? Have you identified best practices?
As one might expect, the answers to these questions from the panelists and audience were diverse.
Even though it may be true that creativity cannot be taught, most agreed that creative elements of
design “can be enhanced” by education and offered suggestions for developing content and sequencing
courses. That design can be taught is, after all, a fundamental premise for design education.
Papers by both Debbie Mayer and Jean Koster illustrated how the teaching and learning processes can
be introduced as early as high school and entry-level courses in university programs. Their
presentations also exemplified how real-world, hands-on experiences can engage students and enhance
learning.
Mark Ewing suggested that design can best be taught using a “building block” approach throughout the
curriculum from the introductory courses through the capstone design sequence by first focusing on
individual skills and then broadening the scope to team activities.
Panelist Aaron Altman broadened the dialogue to address course content and assessment by asking
about the role of computational analysis tools in teaching conceptual design. He also opened the floor
to comparing the outcomes between programs that conduct two-term conceptual design courses with
those offering one-term each of conceptual and detailed design.
Although no specific computational tools or assessment data were identified, the audience underscored
the need to recognize the integrative and iterative nature of design. Some suggested that the design
process may indeed be considered a specialty of systems engineering. A consensus emerged concerning
course sequences proposing that design methodologies would best be introduced early, incorporated
into intermediate courses, and experienced again during a culminating course or project.
What is the role of “build and test” in design education? In particular, how do you conduct
capstone projects, design-build-fly competitions or applied research?
That the session was extended an extra hour can easily be attributed to the audience’s interest in
discussing the role of design-build-fly projects and competitions in design education.
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Gil Crouse, Russ Althof and David Levy, representing the Aircraft Design and Design Engineering
Technical Committees, presented overviews of the Committees’ programs to foster design education
activities and competitions which range from the K-12 Outreach Program to the Graduate Team Aircraft
Design Competition.
AIAA’s Design/Build/Fly (DBF) Competition has evolved over the last fifteen years since its inception to
simply provide an opportunity for students to experience, possibly their first, hands-on design project.
With the number of participants steadily growing over the years, more than 60 teams competed in the
flyoff at the 2010 international competition held at the Cessna Field in Wichita, Kansas. The panelists
described how RFPs, projects and studies, report content and formats, and judging criteria are vetted
through AIAA’s sponsoring Technical Committees.
The fact that a number of universities base their capstone design projects on the DBF competition
opened the floor to a discussion questioning whether such competitions sufficiently prepare students
for advanced education or work in industry.
Aaron Altman questioned whether a competition exercise can provide students with a conceptual
design experience representative of that seen in industry and suggested a complimentary approach
using a full-motion engineering flight simulator, such as the University of Dayton’s recently acquired
Merlin flight simulator, to provide students with a full-scale design experience.
Leland Nicolai, a Lockheed Martin Fellow who had participated in the pre-conference dialogue, voiced
concern that AIAA competitions and capstone design projects be sufficiently realistic. He was further
concerned that instructors be sufficiently prepared to teach in specific areas identified by competition
projects and that projects be applicable to industry.
Citing perspectives from industry described in his relevant paper, co-authored with Eric Schrock, “What
Would Industry Like to See Covered in the Senior Capstone Design Course?” Leland emphasized that
“industry is interested in how students address open-ended problems, deal with requirements, make
assumptions, conduct trade studies and use the results to make design decisions.” He further proposed
that programs offer students opportunities to work in small integrated product teams, and that
programs specifically introduce RFPs, “back-of-the envelope” analyses, realistic configuration
development, trade studies and practices for reviews, documentation, management and ethics in the
profession.
Several suggestions were proposed for the DBF competition: that the rules be minimized and written in
such a way that students learn to write requirements, that the rules be fixed before students start
projects at the beginning of the term, and that two corresponding tracks be considered for awards to
“level the playing field” between capstone design projects and student chapter projects.
How do we balance design education and curricular activities with teaching project
management, business economics, entrepreneurship and leadership? How does your
program foster innovation?
As evidenced by the presentations, successful projects, especially those that are sponsored by agencies
or professional organizations, necessarily include elements of management, leadership and innovation.
The forum’s dialogue acknowledged the challenge. Generally owing to full, tightly packed schedules,
there are few opportunities to provide for additional coursework outside of aerospace curricula. Also
owing to the full, tightly packed schedules of the design courses themselves, instructors have few
opportunities to formally cover these topics in depth. In this environment, “teaching-by-example” and
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significant mentoring serve to integrate these elements into the curriculum. In the process, students
“learn-by-doing” technical methodologies and professional practices all the while acquiring skills for
lifelong learning.
Hernando Jimenez provided insight into the challenge by describing his graduate experience at the
Georgia Institute of Technology’s Aerospace Systems Design Laboratory (ASDL) which features
collaborative, team-centered design facilities. He noted that the masters program brings together
students with diverse design backgrounds from other schools or industry in a collaborative environment
while still affording them the opportunity to “tailor the design project to match their interests, skills and
goals.” By the time they reach the third (and final) term, they are prepared to apply their knowledge to
ASDL research in design applications, methods or processes.
Similarly, the “Discovery-Focused” doctoral program offers a two-semester sequence of aerospace
systems design courses followed by conceptual and preliminary design research. Central to both
graduate programs are the opportunities to benefit from reviews and mentoring by faculty and
practicing engineers from industry.
Acknowledging the challenges to include all of these elements into undergraduate curricula, the
panelists and others, related how they are also augmenting their programs with project reviews and
seminars conducted by mentoring faculty and practicing engineers.
How can an individual’s progress in design skills be measured? How can the design
elements in programs be best assessed?
The forum’s dialogue recognized that there has been a growing trend toward more realistic and
sponsored projects at all levels from high school through graduate programs over the last decade.
There is little doubt that support by government agencies, industry, and professional organizations as
well as the evolving assessment criteria required for accreditation are significant factors influencing the
trend.
Although there was abundant anecdotal recognition of trends and achievements, and although it was
noted that graduates from exemplary programs are “scooped up” by major aerospace companies,
specific processes or metrics for best assessing design education were not described during the session.
The topic remains on the agenda for future forums.
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Appendix: Additional Comments Contributed Via Email
Both the pre-conference and post-session comments contributed via email are summarized in the
following paragraphs.
Design-Build-Fly Competitions
Jean Koster, University of Colorado, spoke to the use of a design-build-fly competition activity as the
capstone design project. In response to a request for a follow-up email summarizing his remarks
(attached as EmailKosterDesignCourse.doc), he wrote “We consider the DBF as a potential major conflict
of interest between good pedagogy and participation on a competition.” He described their two
semester design course, included a sample proposal form and noted the problems caused when the
design competition requirements are not finalized before the students start. Given the rapid pace of the
student project, it is “bad pedagogy to hit students in their first real design project with rambling
customers.” (Sample proposal form attached as KosterProjectProposalPPForm-082209-03-L.doc) Most
recent DBF projects did not include a significant software development component which he considers a
major deficiency when preparing aerospace engineers for real world systems engineering tasks.
Leland Nicolai, Lockheed Martin Corporation, submitted a summary of his interests ahead of the panel
session along with a prior paper titled “What Would Industry Like To See Covered In the Senior Capstone
Design Course?”
In preparation for attending the ASM, Lee wrote to Jeff Forbes, Chair of the AAC, stating his concerns
about the DBF being used for the capstone design course. Lee wanted to address “Is the DBF a suitable
capstone design course topic by suggesting that there are three groups of people that need to be
considered in selecting a capstone design course topic:
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The student – Does the student get a full and complete design experience from the DBF topic?
The design professor – Is the design instructor qualified to teach the DBF topic?
The client or user of the aerospace engineering graduate – Is the DBF topic relevant to the group
hiring the aerospace graduates? (AIAA data indicate that over 50% of the aerospace graduates
go to work for the aerospace industry and government.)”
Lee’s submitted remarks and his discussion during the session centered on the need for the senior level
capstone design course to be conducted like a realistic conceptual design study in industry. While
relevance includes project design and scheduling milestones such as reviews, Lee made strong points
about the inappropriateness of AIAA student design competitions using airships since these products are
a very small segment of the industry’s business base. (Lee’s paper is attached as
NicolaizWhatIndustryWouldLikeToSeeInCapstoneCourseE.pdf and his remarks are attached as
EmailLeeNicolaiWithComments20101217.doc.)
During the forum, Aaron Altman, University of Dayton, spoke to clarifying the origins of the AIAA DBF
completion. In a follow-up email he wrote that he spoke with Mike Selig, one of the creators of the DBF,
and asked him about the DBF being used as the design capstone course. Aaron reports that Mike said
“At its origin, the Student Activities Committee (SAC) was against the idea of DBF specifically because
they feared it would be used as a replacement for a conceptual design capstone course. He had to
convince the SAC that it would not replace, but would be complimentary to these courses, and he was
allowed to proceed with the competition on a provisional basis for 3 years until the SAC was convinced
that their fears would not be realized.” (Attached as EmailAltmanPostConf.doc.)
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Computational Analysis Tools; Design Course Content
It is to be noted that in his response to the initial call for discussion, Aaron Altman addressed several
issues that were introduced but not fully pursued during the forum: use of computational analysis tools
and a comparison of outcomes between a two-term conceptual design course versus a combination of
one-term preliminary and one-term detailed design courses. (Attached as EmailAltmanPreConf.doc)
Funding Design Education
In his comments during the pre-conference dialogue, Steven Collicott from Purdue addressed an
ongoing challenge to design education by asking how research funding can be steered toward teaching.
Noting that effective design-build-test experiences require low student-to-faculty ratios while university
budgets are driving programs to high ratios, he further asked how to justify costs for more effective
design education.
Reflections: Design Education
Participating in the pre-conference dialogue, Bill Mason professor emeritus from the Virginia Polytechnic
Institute and State University, contributed notes from his paper “Reflections on Over 20 Years of Aircraft
Design Class,” in which he described his experience in developing the Virginia Tech aircraft design
program. Detailed with examples and references, his paper reviews approaches, content topics, and
activities including paper and hardware projects. (Attached as
mailBillMasonRegretsWithTopics20101215.doc)
Even while lamenting the lack of preparation for design provided by most engineering science courses
and the lack of experience among faculty, and while acknowledging the challenge to teach everything
that is not engineering science, he concluded that “teaching airplane design is simply a way to have fun
while learning the key aspects of engineering: finding information, using the fundamentals from the
academic classes as a basis for learning independently, teamwork, the engineering design and decision
making process . . . There are many ways to do this.”
In answering the question on whether design can be taught, he noted that “design is totally different
from all other engineering science classes and that students are totally unprepared to think like an
engineer.” He further concluded that whereas it is possible to impact students, there remains a
challenge to influence course content and faculty peers to support design education.
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