Promoting Intra-Disciplinary Design in Civil Engineering Technology: An Approach to Comprehensive Capstone Design Through Faculty and Practitioner Mentorship

Working in teams, civil engineering technology students develop an open-ended design on a project of their choosing. The design integrates several design and engineering concepts including design alternatives, design assumptions, value engineering, cost, safety, construction feasibility, construction scheduling, engineering ethics and engineering economy. All projects include elements of civil engineering sub-disciplines, including structural, hydraulic, site-civil, environmental and geotechnical engineering into the design. To facilitate teams, the course is team-taught by a group of faculty with expertise in specific sub-disciplines of civil engineering. In addition, other practicing professionals, faculty and/or alumni are available to students to provide expertise, advise and mentor in other topic areas relevant to the particular design. Access to multiple faculty and practicing professionals allows students to develop design concepts to project-specific challenges that often have more than one civil engineering area of specialty. The course format promotes student development in both integrated design as well as project-based teamwork and has been recognized as a program strength as an outcome of a recent accreditation review.