(372s) Chemical Engineering Lab for Seniors at United States Military Academy

The United States Military Academy has been ABET accredited since 2012. One of our capstone courses for senior chemical engineering students is CH459, Chemical Engineering Lab. This course has evolved since its inception to now include a total of six laboratory exercises, consisting of 6 lab periods each with an expected deliverable of a poster, executive summary, or full laboratory report. The rubric for each lab includes an independently developed lab experimental design/procedure with a minimum of three successful runs with usable data; chemical engineering process controls Laplace block diagram; data analysis and calculations to include mass and energy balance; Kline-McKlintock error propagation and error analysis; and a full CHEMCAD model of the process with plausible explanations of discrepancies. In addition there is a requirement for a face to face in progress review on the deliverable within 24 hours of completion of the last lab period, which allows for adequate coaching and mentoring of the scientific writing process. During the semester the cadets must also do the SACHE training and during the Distillation Lab they are required to practice the startup procedure using a proprietary chemical engineering controls software.

The way in which the course is managed has allowed our chemical engineering seniors to develop acumen with respect to scientific writing and we have seen anecdotal improvement with respect to the quality of the poster, executive summary, and full lab report deliverables. Lastly, the students enrolled conduct peer evaluations on their lab team members to further their development as leaders and lab team members, and reinforce the concept of working as a member of a team.