Bridges To Better Engineering Education

I often use the metaphor of the bridge when I speak on many of our projects at Quanser. Not only is it entirely appropriate and colorful for an engineering audience but it is a very useful metaphor when one discusses some of the most pressing challenges in global engineering education.  Take for example, the challenge of building a strong conceptual and experiential bridge between the typical high school experience and the typical university program in engineering. It is true that most preparatory high school curricula will include the fundamental sciences and mathematics and the idea has always been the first year university curriculum will build upon this foundation using its own math and science courses. Following that would be the series of application courses which will take the student from the abstract to the concrete.

Bridging the gap between high school and university is essential.

The reality is that many engineering educators are experiencing significant disconnects between the high school experience and the university expectations. For them, this is a chasm that must be bridged. The consequences of doing nothing are actually quite severe. Not only is enrollment into the Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) programs dropping in many jurisdictions, but the retention rate once students arrive is also disconcerting. Many universities  have reported on the order of a third or more of these students dropping out or changing majors. These issues of qualified student recruitment and retaining the intellectual and emotional connection with young students on-campus is the highest priority challenges for many institutions.

Extra-curricular engineering experiences in high school are valuable.

Over the past week, I had the opportunity to meet and explore bridge-building ideas with individuals who are neck-deep into this very murky situation.

First stop was St. Louis to attend the annual Judge Advisor training session of the FIRST Robotics program. The Judge Advisor is the chief judge of each of the regional competitions as well as a participating judge in the national championships. Our group consists of primarily senior professionals from industry with a few forward-looking professors in the mix. All of us are volunteers and all of us believe in the positive benefit of a highly charged and ambitious extra-curricular engineering experience for high school students. The Judging Team is responsible for encouraging and rewarding those teams who not only excel in the technical dimensions of the competition but also the "big picture" aspects of engineering including ethics, entrepreneurship, and societal responsibility. At the annual training sessions, we converge, learn about changes in the competition, and most importantly, we welcome and train the cohort of new Judge Advisors who have been recruited during the previous year.

Alan and Cindy, Chief Judge Advisor for FIRST, moderate one of the more controversial moments during the sesson: "Why is it so bloody cold in St. Louis and how do we move next year's session to Hawaii"?

I'd like to report that we made huge progress and launched outrageous new ideas that will propel FIRST to new heights … but I can't. For the most part it was fairly well-organized and no-nonsense. The reality is, the FIRST concept works. It has found the formula for triggering a passion among an entire generation of young people who may not have had any opportunity to experience real world science and engineering. And it has also successfully integrated a richly multidimensional framework that promotes the complete experience and not just making robots dance. The annual training weekend is really a chance for us to reaffirm our belief and commitment to the values of FIRST and with a bit of luck come up with a few clever ideas for the upcoming season.

Teaching more rigorous engineering concepts in high school is seen as key.

Following St. Louis, I moved on to Albuquerque, New Mexico, home of the famed University of New Mexico (UNM). Over the years, it has earned a reputation as a top tier research university in the US and boasts a broad range of academic achievements.

A couple of months ago, Professor Ramiro Jordan of UNM's Electrical and Computer Engineering Department visited the Quanser offices to discuss our potential participation in a new UNM initiative to introduce more rigorous engineering concepts into the high school system.  Their model is the Advanced Placement (AP) system. In the AP system, high school students can take more challenging versions of English, physics, math and so on - the so-called core courses - and receive university level credit for them prior to entering the freshman year. This allows the student to either take a broader range of courses or accelerates their time in university.

The faculty at UNM felt that they could apply the same concept with the primary freshman engineering courses. That is, have students study engineering computing, design, and other key concepts in high school. So an AP student can theoretically complete an entire semester's worth of engineering studies prior to arrival on campus. The first step was an exploratory session with university and high school officials. Joining me for this leg of the trip was Quanser founder Jacob Apkarian.

We were invited to the discussion because of our work in developing new education concepts in undergraduate engineering. In addition to the many logistical challenges of this initiative, there is also a parallel set of issues surrounding the relevance of the existing freshman engineering curriculum for the modern world. If we're going to go through the effort of shifting courses down to the high school, we might as well reflect on the quality of the courses, some of which are over twenty years old.

Modern engineering education requires an engaging, hands-on approach.

The Quanser perspective is fairly straightforward. You cannot have effective engineering education without thoroughly modern, engaging, hands-on lab experiences.  This was the founding principle of the company and, over time, we've developed a strong reputation as an industrial partner who is genuinely active and forward-thinking on matters of engineering education. Jacob and I were delighted find that our strong opinions on the importance of the lab were shared by all at the table.

The core questions of "What should be the primary concepts of freshman engineering?" and "How can labs bring these labs to life?" consumed the larger part of our two day visit and in the end, we were given an opportunity to explore these concepts in more detail back at Quanser and return with a complete proposal.

Jacob Apkarian, founder of Quanser, in discussions with Electrical and Computer Engineering faculty at the Univesity of New Mexico.

There are many things that we do at the company that are exciting and important but this particular discussion seems that much more exciting and important. First is the sheer intellectual challenge of adapting modern engineering practice to a level appropriate for high school students, while at the same time maintaining the high academic standards of a leading university. But there is also the human dimension. My children are 16 and 13 so I, like all parents, have developed some very strong opinions on high school education. As good as their school is, the deficiencies and disconnects are all too evident. This is especially pronounced in the context of STEM education. Extended to the societal level, most of us would agree, I believe, that creating a more cohesive and enriching education experience from K12 right on to grad school is one of the more noble quests in any society.
Our concepts are starting to take shape. And the totality of Quanser expertise is beginning to guide our thinking. At this early stage, we have no idea how far this initiative will go in making a real difference in the lives of our children but it's very satisfying to know that we have been recognized as part of the answer and I feel very privileged that we are going to vigorously take on this complex challenge.

- Tom Lee

  As Chief Education Officer at Quanser, Tom Lee is focused on spearheading the development of Quanser's global academic community. He is closely involved with Quanser's technology and solution development process and the company's partner and alliance programs. He holds a PhD in Mechanical Engineering, and an MASc and BASc in Systems Design Engineering from the University of Waterloo.

Controls Experiment ROTPEN QNET on NI ELVIS Wows Grade 8 Girls Interested in Engineering

Every year, Blair McKay, the electronics teacher at Listowel District Secondary School, invites Grade 8 students to his custom-designed electronics lab. During the electronics workshops - eDays - the students can find out more about electronics and robotics and engage in hands-on activities.

The eDays are held separately for boys and girls so the students are less constrained by gender stereotypes. Girls in particular seem more confident and enthusiastic when they aren’t worried about what the boys are thinking. For the girls eDay, the guest speakers are all women who have exciting careers in electrical engineering, computer engineering and mechatronics.

I have been a guest speaker at eDays since 2004. This year, I talked to the girls about how much fun I have working at Quanser, and I showed them one of our co-developed teaching solutions, Quanser's QNET Rotary Inverted Pendulum Trainer (ROTPEN QNET), which integrates with the National Instruments ELVIS II platform. It's designed to captivate young minds interested in understanding the basic self-balancing principles used in space flight. The girls were impressed that the trainer could balance a vertical rod on the tip of a rotating arm, especially after Blair McKay demonstrated how difficult it is to balance a ruler on the tip of his finger! 

Grade 8 students get a closer look at the ROTPEN QNET (inverted pendulum) experiment in order to gain a better understanding of  the self-balancing principles used in space flight.

“The goal of these workshops,” says Blair, “is to encourage young people to consider careers in electronics, robotics and computer engineering. It is a pleasure to have Heidi be a part of the girls eDay program. She always does a great job, sharing her passion for engineering. It is evident to everyone present that she enjoys working at Quanser. The fact that she is able to demonstrate some of Quanser's really cool products is an added bonus. My only regret with having her at Listowel District Secondary School is that she never leaves behind any of her toys!”

The eDay workshops are clearly successful at attracting young women to take electronics in high school. At Listowel District Secondary School, Grade 9 electronics is taught as part of an Introduction to Technology class, and there are typically two full all-girl classes!

Quanser Helps High School Team Prepare for Robotics Competition

St. Robert Catholic High School in Markham, Ontario, Canada is entering as a “rookie” team in the 2012 FIRST Robotics Canada Competition – and Quanser is proud to be the school's sponsor. To get better acquainted with the students, we invited them, along with students from St. Brother Andre High School, to a kickoff meeting at Quanser's Markham headquarters in December of 2011.

Mark Breadner, Executive Director of FIRST Canada, sponsor of the FIRST Robotics Competition, gives the students an idea of the excitement and learning opportunities they'll experience as they take part in the competition. 

Students from St. Robert and also from St. Brother Andre High Schools in Markham, Canada attended this "get acquainted" session and had plenty of questions for our engineers during a Q &A session.

A student gets her hands on a tele-robotic system that relates to a wide range of real-world applications, including everything frorm handling nuclear waste disposal to performing remote surgery.

Getting their hands on a mobile robot as it performs a variety of tasks is valuable experience for students who'll be building their own robot in the 2012 FIRST Robotics Competition.

Once here, they jumped at the opportunity to control our robots, talk to real engineers as well as Mark Breadner, Executive Director of FIRST Robotics Canada, and feel the excitement that’s part of a life in engineering innovation. 

View the video and experience it from the kids’ point of view!

From Russia With Love: Control Professors Impressed with LabVIEW-based Experiments

As part of our ongoing process of integrating Quanser products and curriculum with National Instruments (NI) products and software, I travelled to Russia in December to attend the Engineering, Scientific and Educational  Applications Based on National Instruments Technologies Conference, where I was to meet the young and energetic NI Russia sales team.

It was the perfect opportunity to introduce them to our capabilities and show them how the Quanser/NI integration plans could help them better serve the Russian academic market. It was also an occasion for me to meet many Russian controls professors and introduce them to Quanser products and capabilities.

Delegates at the recent conference "Engineering, Scientific and Educational Applications Based on National Instruments Technologies" in Moscow, Russia had an opportunity to see live demos of integrated Quanser/NI systems.

As the title of this blog suggests, our visit was a huge success. The Quanser booth turned out to be one of the busiest, best attended ones at the conference, and our product demos and solutions created quite a bit of excitement.

QNETs are already available in Russia from NI. At the conference, we demonstrated the Quanser Driving Simulator and the Active Suspension workstation.  These demos work seamlessly with NI's Compact Rio and LabVIEW, and come with LabVIEW-based course materials. These workstations are gaining a lot of interest at engineering labs around the world because they save educators precious time while enriching their students’ educational experience.

Quanser and NI product marketing material proves to be extremely popular
with the conference delegates.

When professors learned that Quanser had over 80 experiments for control labs, many of which easily integrate with NI products, they were very excited.  When they found out that our future products would be built with NI integration in mind, they were even happier. Ultimately our integrated focus will enable NI to offer more choice and flexibility to the Russian academic market.

That’s of utmost importance. With more choice come more ways for universities to integrate their existing LabVIEW software and NI hardware with Quanser control experiments to offer students the most exciting and practical engineering education experience. This flexibility is particularly valuable where university budgets are constrained. Recruitment and retention of students is also a key focus.

Delegates took a hands-on approach to getting familiar with Quanser/NI systems.

The depth of Quanser experiments and course materials is an added benefit to the teaching community. Quanser experiments are designed to reflect real-world industrial applications and help graduate young engineers ready to be of value to their employers right away.

The NI Russia team is fully onboard with the exciting possibilities offered by the Quanser/NI partnership.  Our NI colleagues are now in a better position to suggest how to best pair Quanser experiments with NI products to provide cost-effective solutions that meet Russian university teaching needs.

- Amirpasha Javid

Amirpasha Javid is an Applications Engineer at Quanser.  He brings his past experience in developing Quanser controls systems and course materials to his current role of sharing his technical expertise with existing and new business relationships.

The Spotlight's On Quanser In the Latest Issue of EEWeb - Pulse Magazine

EEWeb-Pulse magazine, a leading e-zine for the electrical engineering community, features not one but two stories about Quanser in its January 17, 2012 issue.

The first article, an interview with Tom Lee, focuses on Tom's role as Quanser's Chief Education Officer and on how Quanser's engaged, hands-on approach to engineering education is designed to serve "the overall mandate of the university, as well as the emerging influences and trends of global industry."

The second article, authored by Tom himself, is titled, "What's New at Quanser?" and outlines some of our latest activities and initiatives. To read both stories, click here.

A New Addition to Our Systems and Control Team

John Daly recently joined Quanser's engineering team as a Systems and Control Engineer. John brings a strong background in control systems theory to this position, as well as a wealth of experience with unmanned systems. He will be working on implementing advanced algorithms on teleoperated and fully autonomous unmanned systems, both airborne and grounded.

An area of particular interest to John and Quanser is the control of robotic manipulators.

John holds a PhD in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Waterloo (2010). He earned a BEng in Computer Systems Engineering and a MASc in Electrical Engineering from Carleton University in Ottawa. Most of his graduate research work focused on controlling robotic manipulators, which is an area of particular interest at Quanser.

An affinity for math and science through his school years led John to take his first step towards an engineering career. But a summer spent at a science and computer camp run by engineering students at Carleton University really helped point the way. His decision to pursue that the engineering life soon followed. In his spare time John enjoys cooking, camping and skiing. Welcome to Quanser, John!

The Two Sides of Korea

No, this is not a commentary on the political situation in Korea, but an account of a series of events that transpired over a scant three months involving an intriguing combination of international meetings in China, Korea and Canada... yes, it still does sound like a political tale, doesn't it?

In October of 2011, Quanser CEO Paul Gilbert and I attended the Global Colloquium on Engineering Education in Shanghai. There, we, by chance, met with Professor Wonjong Joo of Seoul National University of Science and Technology (affectionately referred to as SeoulTech). Through various chats and coffee breaks, we discovered that he ws the director of a "Hub Center" in a national inititative called the Innovation Centers for Engineering Education (ICEE). This is a well-funded government initiative that identified 60 leading engineering universities in Korea and encouraged them to research and establish innovative practices to transform the engineering curriculum to better meet the needs of the roaring Korean industrial sector of the 21st century.

South Korea has earned the reputation of a "miracle" economy. Within a single generation, the nation innovated itself up from theashes of two brutal wars and foreign occupation. Since the 1960's when the basic infrasturcture stabilized, the average annual income climbed from $100 to the current $20,000 - from the extreme end of "third world" existence to one of the most respected and dynamic economies of today. To continue its progress, the country has concluded that it needed a community of modern engineers who not only escelled technically but were also innovative and global in their worldview. Indeed, mega-companies such as Samsung strongly expressed a desire to close the gap between the skill sets of engineering graduates with the needs of conttemporary Korean industry. ICEE was born out of these needs.

Side one of this tale was an invitation by Dr.Joo to me to speak at a conference of Korean engineering educators representing the network of ICEE institutions. This was held in early December of 2011 on the famous Jeju Island off the southern tip of Korea. This island has a very special place in the hearts of the people of the country. Volcanic in origin, it offers a startling comination of natural beauty and cultural uniqueness even within a larger context of the Korean nation which generally prides itself on its cutural uniqueness. In all, it was a very stimulating and collegial environment to engage in healthy discussions on pedagogy.

Professor Joo and I pose atop Seongsan volcanic peak, a landmark on Jeju Island

What I learned from my new friends was enlightening and heartening. The discussion were dominated by ideas and case studies on increasing the relevance and experiential dimensions in modern engineering education. Hands-on, application-driven, collaborative, immersive and interactive were the kind of words that framed all of the discussions. for a country whose traditional education paradigms enforced intensive absorption oand uncompromising discipline, this was indeed refreshing. Over the years my own views on education have generally challenged the traditional linearity of the North American curriculum; certainly ths success of the Quanser business is founded on this modern perspective as well.

Leaving my mark on the rugged beaches of Jeju

Side two of this tale occurs on the other side of the world. In addition to the generous invitation that I received to address the Korean conference, I also received a request  from Professor Joo for help in facilitating a visit to Canada to learn more about how education innovation happens here. The fun part about this visit, as I quickly learned, was that the visit would not be one or two professors but a delegation of 23 people representing 11 institutions. Somehow we had to engineer an itinerary that combined visits to leading Canadian universities and industry... and this had to happen during a very short visit duration of two days. In the end we settled on a visit to York University, currently in the process of increasing its undergraduate engineering program from 500 to 2000 students; the University of Waterloo, arguably Canada's most successful engineering program; and a visit to our own headquarters to gain insight into progressive Canadian industry.

The delegation at the University of Waterloo's Student Design Center

With both universities, we received a rich and engaging series of sessions covering a vast range of education topics with respectively unique views from the two institutions. Waterloo has a 60 year history of doing the unconventional. From building the world's largest co-op program, to introducing new interdisciplinary programs at a blistering pace, to methodically expanding its positive influence through community outreach programs, it has set the standard for academic engineering innovation. York, being the rising star within the Canadian engineering scene, draws from its global reputation as a center for fundamental sciences, humanities and business and has attempted to redefine what the modern engineer should be.

Quanser curriculum developer Peter Martin demonstrates a new application concept for control systems labs

Yes, the modern engineer should be technically proficient, but she must also be interdisciplinary in thinking, entrepreneurial in ambition, creative in methodology, and global in attitude. At Quanser, the delegation had an opportunity to see and feel first hand some of the latest technology trends that, we believe, will transform the way universities deliver essential engineering experiences to students.

For me as a Korean-born Canadian, this was an amazing chance to experience the Korean academic community in the home country and in my adopted country. I felt privileged that the two sides of my heritage converged on the key context of education, a context that has been so important to me for many years. And in the end, I'm happy to report that, as the cliche goes, there seems to be more that draws us together than keeps us apart.

- Dr. Tom Lee

As Chief Education Officer at Quanser, Tom Lee is focused on spearheading the development of Quanser's global academic community. He is closely involved with Quanser's technology and solution development process and the company's partner and alliance programs. He holds a PhD in Mechanical Engineering, and an MASc and BASc in Systems Design Engineering from the University of Waterloo.