New Course Requirement in Electrical and Computer Engineering
ECE380/380L Electrical Engineering Practice
As part of the changes related to Boise State’s Foundational Studies Program (to be implemented Fall
2012), a new Communication-In-Discipline (CID) course and lab are being added to the degree
requirements for Electrical and Computer Engineering:
ECE 380 Electrical Engineering Practice (2-0-2) (S) Fundamentals in the practice of Electrical
Engineering as a profession. The topics include written and oral communication within Electrical
Engineering; engineering project management and economics; design of experiment, systems,
processes, and devices; testing, reliability, lifetime, and failure analysis; manufacturing; ethics;
sustainability; and engineering professionalism. PREREQ: ECE212, ECE288, ENGL202.
ECE 380L Electrical Engineering Practice Lab (0-3-1) (S) Laboratory work on Electrical Engineering
Practice. COREQ: ECE380
Implementation
New Students:
Implementation of this new course will begin in the spring of 2013. This course will affect incoming
freshman students using the new catalog (2013-2014). That catalog will specify ECE 380/L as a required
course along with all of the new Foundations requirements. Students will still have 4 ECE electives and 2
technical electives as part of their requirements in addition to a number of Foundations and Disciplinary
Lens courses. Some Disciplinary Lens courses are required.
Current Students:
Students taking Senior Design (ECE480/482) in the fall of 2012
Students who take the Senior Design sequence in the fall of 2012 will be unaffected by this new change
and may take their courses as planned.
Students taking Senior Design (ECE480/482) in the fall of 2013, 2014, and 2015
All students who plan to take the Senior Design sequence in the Fall of 2013-2015 MUST TAKE ECE380/L.
Students who plan to take Senior Design I (ECE480) in the Fall of 2013 will be required to take ECE380/L in
the Spring of 2013. ECE380/L will be a prerequisite for ECE480. In addition, students must note that
ENGL202 Technical Communications is prerequisite for ECE380, so students must have taken ENGL202 by
the fall of 2012 if they need to take ECE380 in the spring of 2013. All students taking Senior Design in 2014
and 2015 must also take ECE380/L as a prerequisite. As illustrated in table 1 below, students may use
ECE380/L to meet EITHER their ECE Elective or their Technical Elective requirement through the fall of
2015. Beginning in fall 2016, ECE 380 will become an official degree requirement and will no longer be
counted as an elective.
Table 1: ECE380/L Implementation by Year
Semester Student
Takes ECE480
Is ECE 380/L
Required?
What are the
Prerequisites?
How can ECE 380 be used as
an Elective Course?
Fall 2012
Not Required
N/A
N/A
Fall 2013
Yes, must take
by Spring 2013
ENGL 202
(take by Fall 2012)
May count as ECE or Tech
Elective
Fall 2014
Yes, must take
by Spring 2014
ENGL 202
(take by Fall 2013)
May count as ECE or Tech
Elective
Fall 2015
Yes, must take
by Spring 2015
ENGL 202
(take by Fall 2014)
May count as ECE or Tech
Elective
Fall 2016
Yes, must take
by Spring 2016
ENGL 202
(take by Fall 2015)
ECE 380 is now required and
will NOT count as an elective