(552d) An Introduction to Design for Chemical Engineering Undergraduates

Daryl R. Williams

Department of Chemical Engineering, Imperial College London, South Kensington Campus, London SW7 2AZ, UK

(d.r.williams@imperial.ac.uk +44 (0) 0207 594 5611)

Imperial College runs a 4 year MEng degree course in chemical engineering, All students start the course as chemical engineers, and the first year curriculum contains a number of core CE courses including fluid mechanics, heat and mass transport and engineering design.

In the first-year Design course, we introduce students in their first semester of study to problem solving and group work, both of which figure in the activities of a professional engineer. This is achieved by introducing students to the different type of problems they are likely to encounter. Our aims are to make students better able to: § define problems and responsibilities; § distinguish between different sorts of problems; § deal with design problems for which there are many solutions by identifying the data needed to tackle the problem, and generating, evaluating and presenting solutions; § work as a member of a group by contributing effectively, sharing work and involving all members of a team.

The students should appreciate that for many problems there are no unique solutions, there may be wrong ones, but also many correct ones, which is best for a certain situation depend on many factors, some of which may be beyond the control of the design team. Students should learn that every member of the team is important, not just the loud ones, and should begin to develop skills to extract the best from all. The students should learn that there is a huge amount of information available and that it is important to ask the correct questions

The course is run as a series of problems classes, the problem is posed, the students consider the problem, ask questions, either individually to the teaching team or in a plenary session and then attempt the design, asking further questions when necessary

For assessment the students will undertake a design and be assessed on the quality of the design brief they write, an oral presentation they give and a poster they construct concerning their designs.

This lecture will review the course structure and outputs as well as the teaching strategy of this early stage course.