(455c) Real-World Thematic Problem Creation to Engage Students In Material and Energy Balances

Chemical engineering as a discipline can seem more divorced from students' daily lives compared to other engineering disciplines where they have experienced a physical embodiment arising from a discipline, like flying on an airplane for aerospace engineering, or crossing a bridge for civil engineering.  Most students, and the general population, have never seen an industrial reactor and they may not recognize a distillation column as they drive down expressways.

Real-world problems can be constructed for many classes that develops connections between more abstract material and the essential problem solving skills needed to become successful engineers.  This work describes how thematic problems focusing on one physical embodiment can be used to thread material together from material and energy balances while introducing the ability to handle complex problems.  Specific examples include bottled water, doing laundry, pistachios, and Jello shots.  The introduction of these thematic subjects has also allowed for the inclusion of information literacy skills as the real-world problems have substances where physical data is not in textbooks.  Students also learn critical thinking skills because data they find during their information searches is often vague, has a range of values, or contradicts each other.  This trains students for some difficulties they will face in their professional lives.

 Students have responded well to these materials since they have been implemented, commenting that they work harder at mastering the material because they suspect their creation was difficult.  Many students, even non-majors, email newspaper articles and media pieces and suggest future problems that could be built around that idea, some even creating the problem statements a year or two after completing the course.    Finally, an algorithmic process for selecting themes is described.