Web-Based Collaboration Tool in Engineering Design Courses

In our capstone design courses, a team of senior engineering students works on a problem specified by an industrial partner.The course goals are to develop a solution and to demonstrate its feasibility in a 15 week semester.A web-based bulletin board system was integrated into the courses as an on-line collaboration tool in the spring of 2005.Although the students required little encouragement to start using this system, many project teams quickly learned to use it productively and obtained good results.The system allowed sponsor mentors to share project information with a broader audience within their organization.It enabled them to provide better and timelier feedback to students and faculty; therefore, the students were able to explore more realistic design solutions.The faculty advisers were also able to assess a team's progress, problems, and individual contributions more effectively by monitoring information posted by the team.The system made a significant impact on the project outcome and students' learning experience.