Project-based learning (PBL) is a new and efficient learning method that has been widely adopted by schools in North America and Northern Europe.
Oklahoma State University (OSU), a state university
in the United States
, is no exception. They designed
the ENDEAVOR
laboratory specifically for undergraduates. NI provides
strong support with many solutions such as
ELVIS III
to help them
expand teaching activities beyond the classroom, improve students' hands-on practical skills, reduce teaching costs, and
explore new boundaries of education with OUS.
Author: Brad Rowland, PhD, Head of ENDEAVOR Laboratory
Figure 1. Main entrance of CEAT ENDEAVOR laboratory
Oklahoma State University is currently carrying out a teaching reform, and the key lies in the ENDEAVOR laboratory. The teaching reform aims to expand teaching activities beyond the classroom, increase the time for undergraduates to conduct experiments and exploration, integrate knowledge from multiple disciplines through hands-on practice, and improve their future employment competitiveness.
Why is ENDEAVOR called the ultimate playground for engineering students?
The following video will give you the answer
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Problems encountered in the process of building the ENDEAVOR laboratory
How do humans learn? According to experience, humans acquire knowledge and skills through continuous practice. For example, when we are learning to walk, we fall down again and again, but we get up again and again, and we keep trying. When we are learning to ride a bicycle, we try again and again, and we become more and more proficient with practice until we can completely master it. In short, we learn by doing. So why can't engineering learning be like this? Isn't it the most effective way for students to master engineering knowledge through hands-on practice?
In the 19th century, our society experienced the Industrial Revolution. In order to meet the industry's demand for highly skilled personnel and to improve speed and efficiency as much as possible, classrooms/lecture halls came into being, and large numbers of students began to be able to quickly obtain information from a single person. This venue effectively promoted the dissemination of knowledge, but it relied heavily on repetition (mainly the need to repeat the explanation to the students).
However, today's environment challenges this traditional model. Modern engineering students are in an era of information explosion. The large amount of information seriously distracts their attention, making the classroom teaching method, which has been around for nearly a century, less effective. Teaching staff must attract and retain students' attention and encourage them to think actively.
Students must be in an environment where they are exposed to engineering principles at all times and their curiosity is stimulated. They need a place that encourages them to use cutting-edge industrial hardware in interdisciplinary teams to intuitively understand course concepts through direct application. Students must also be able to simulate situations that they may encounter in the future workplace to truly understand what it means to be an engineer. Our team is confident that we can create such a learning space for students.
We also asked ourselves, “Can we introduce technology in this way to improve student retention and reduce attrition?” To answer this question, we looked to a source of information that everyone uses: YouTube. YouTube explainer videos allow us to learn by imitating the experts. When students get stuck, they can just replay and watch a task over and over again until they understand it. Providing thousands of students with the vast amount of instructor resources like YouTube is certainly not cost-effective, but it is possible to build and equip a facility that can take advantage of such tools.
Figure 2. Sophomores and juniors doing experiments in the communications lab
Step by step to realize the vision
The idea of providing undergraduates with an immersive learning experience through projects and experiments is very attractive, but it is also susceptible to skepticism. This transformation requires not only physical/human/infrastructure investments, but also cultural changes, which may be difficult. Therefore, faculty and departments must re-examine the teaching methods that have been adopted since the founding of the university. They need to reflect on and adjust degree plans, course structures, new/old/redundant courses, the number of hours required for graduation, and certification to effectively provide an immersive learning environment for all students.
To meet the infrastructure needs of this transformation, we focused on several key concepts: establishing a central facility that can serve more than 8,000 undergraduates; providing a range of advanced industrial tools for undergraduate use; promoting interdisciplinary applications (facilities and equipment should belong to the entire school rather than individual departments); and establishing relevant modern courses. These concepts are also the starting point for our search for partners and are also reflected in the OSU teaching reform proposals we have made to education and industry partners.
The teaching reform of CEAT is a long-term and arduous task. We not only united the various colleges of CEAT, but also included the College of Humanities and Sciences, the College of Agriculture and Forestry, and the College of Business. Our leader, Dean Paul Tikalsky, always insisted on the right direction and played a vital role in promoting this reform.
ENDEAVOR's innovation cornerstone
The ENDEAVOR lab is a 72,000 square foot exploratory environment equipped with a variety of prototyping, testing, and measurement equipment, managed by a small team of professors and undergraduate students.
Because the building is designed to allow students to explore at any time, we carefully considered details such as exposed wall sections to allow students to explore various principles - from lab insulation measures to how elevators work. From measurement systems embedded in the staircases to sensors for thermodynamic testing throughout the room to equations on the floor, students are immersed in the atmosphere of engineering from the moment they enter the lab.
Figure 3. Each desk in the electrical engineering lab is equipped with NI ELVIS III
Figure 4. Student lab manager configuring a water tank in the ENDEAVOR fluid laboratory
Experimental equipment and cooperation with NI
Since ENDEAVOR serves students from multiple engineering disciplines as well as other schools, we needed to cover a wide range of course topics and allow each department to use a variety of tools seamlessly. After learning about our challenges, NI worked with us to equip ENDEAVOR with state-of-the-art test and measurement equipment.
NI's industrial products (such as CompactRIO and CompactDAQ) provide great convenience for us by enabling us to easily switch between thermodynamics, fluid mechanics, and material experiments. Their NI ELVIS III solution can be integrated into many courses such as circuits and wireless communications.
OSU's engineering department enrolls more than 1,500 new undergraduates each year, and we believe that they can develop engineering intuition, conduct practical experiments, and obtain relevant data from the first day of enrollment. Since ENDEAVOR equipment is for all students, these devices need to be low-cost, durable, and easy to use. NI ELVIS III has completely changed our laboratory teaching. This solution not only integrates multiple bench instruments such as power supplies, function generators, and analyzers into one platform, but also provides the measurementslive.ni.com environment, making it a perfect choice for us.
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With these features and the ability to prototype with an embedded onboard processor, we can help students build a solid foundation starting in their first year before transitioning to full designs using the smaller myRIO platform. The value of NI platforms is that they can be adapted to different scales, such as teaching a foundation course on NI ELVIS III and then further consolidating knowledge and validating ideas on large industrial equipment. Because students are already proficient in using NI technology, we don’t have to repeat ourselves as much, freeing up more time to focus on teaching engineering concepts.
”
Figure 5. Sophomore students use myRIO to complete the tracking robot prototype
ENDEAVOR is more than just a building, it is a catalyst for a shift in thinking. Our faculty are taking a fresh approach to teaching foundational courses that focuses heavily on project-based and experiential learning. This has transformed several courses offered at OSU:
Circuit Fundamentals
: Students can verify theories in class by connecting their laptops to the NI ELVIS III and using Measurements Live to acquire measurements. This process helps students truly connect theory to practice.
Digital Design:
This course requires students to build a state machine on NI ELVIS III to simulate the taillights of a 1967 Ford Thunderbird. Students are required to complete the user interaction requirements within a specified time frame, and the final grade is based on how well their final product meets these requirements.
Embedded Computers:
Students can use NI digital system development boards to quickly develop and reinforce theoretical knowledge through hands-on practice. For example, students combined this system with NI ELVIS III to develop a fully functional NES Classic Edition that can run Super Mario Brothers in an FPGA environment.
Measurement & Instrumentation:
Combining biomedical sensors with Nerf guns is a great way to engage students! In this course, students connect analog sensors to an embedded controller. They then use the NI ELVIS III to acquire EKG data and model how players fire Nerf guns by bending their ring fingers.
Wireless Communications:
OSU has never offered a wireless communications lab for undergraduates. Now, through a partnership with NI, we offer a wireless communications course that starts with the NI ELVIS III and Emona communications boards and then moves on to more complex solutions such as the USRP (Universal Software Radio Peripheral) for research applications. There are only about four labs in the country comparable to ENDEAVOR's RF/COM lab, but none of them are designed specifically for undergraduate education.
Design Courses:
NI devices and software also helped students improve their academic performance. NI provides a common platform and fast learning cycle for building more advanced industrial prototypes as well as ENDEAVOR systems and autonomous vehicle research. Perhaps most impressive is the students' enthusiasm: one team is building an autonomous BB-8 robot using a cutting-edge drive system. Another team is using LabVIEW and myRIO to acquire and integrate sensor data while connecting to NVIDIA for artificial intelligence processing. Their goal is to invent a self-driving car that can automatically learn obstacle courses.
Course Upgrade:
NI equipment and LabVIEW software are helping us quickly upgrade slow traditional courses to courses that meet modern industry needs and hot topics. NI products shorten development tasks that usually take weeks or even months to complete to days. Due to the reduced workload required, more advanced courses and concepts originally intended for graduate students are now also available to juniors. In addition to reforming the engineering design course, we also plan to set up advanced application courses around the courses currently being studied, so stay tuned!
The lab facilities, equipment, and revamped curriculum have greatly motivated students, reduced costs, and promoted partnerships with other schools. Currently,
there are 60 NI ELVIS III devices throughout the lab, and we plan to add more equipment and other NI tools to various schools and departments at CEAT. We have completed the first round of teaching of the new curriculum, and 60% of the students have become instructors, lab managers, or representatives assigned to other schools and departments.
The College of Business is investing in a program to train entrepreneurial students who will develop product pitches and “hire” student resources to prototype their ideas at ENDEAVOR. Physics students are currently taking ENDEAVOR courses, and next semester even students from completely unrelated colleges like Theatre Studies will sign up for ENDEAVOR courses. We support outreach and teacher training for STEM students in CEAT and the College of Agriculture and Forestry. On the cultural side, we support and encourage outreach to CEAT student organizations as well as the community. The spirit or essence that people feel when they walk through the doors of ENDEAVOR goes far beyond the building or the lab itself: it becomes a natural extension of the OSU cowboy spirit.
NI is a great partner in our work. Not only does they provide a unified and effective solution, but their global platform also expands the network reach of our information. Together, we are pushing the limits of technology and inspiring innovation. Our joint presentation at NIWeek and the American Society for Engineering Education has sparked a new round of dialogue with The Open University in the UK to explore new forms of globally connected teaching methods.
ENDEAVOR is more than just a building. It is a way to make engineering an innovative and creative discipline. Although the lab was only officially opened in August 2018, the students were very excited when they found that ENDEAVOR met their expectations. Our goal is to attract a global audience and pass on the spirit of ENDEAVOR to any student who wants to become an engineer.
Finally, let’s review the NI products mentioned in this article.
NI ELVIS III
myRIO
CompactRIO
CompactDAQ
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