EXPERIENTIAL LEARNING FOR UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS THROUGH COLLABORATIVE CAPSTONE PROJECTS ON ADVANCED MANUFACTURING

In order for students to enhance their understanding of engineering concepts, hands-on experience has proven to be essential. Incorporating the design component in undergraduate engineering education has been an immediate and pressing concern for educators, professional societies, industrial employers and agencies concerned with national productivity and competitiveness. While there are various ways of achieving that, one proven method is to have students working on projects and thinking about the learning objectives and tasks they are doing, a.k.a, experiential learning. There are several strong reasons to advocate the selection of experiential learning-based classroom teaching. An active learning-based approach can encompass both isolated and highly structured activities to motivate students to take charge of their deep learning. Active learning-based learning can also be very effective in creating personal connections between students and the course material, which strongly increases the student's motivation to learn proactively. In addition to the course content, active learningbased learning develops life skills like improving subject mastery with others feedback, collaboration, and brainstorming to reach the most rational answers. Recently, advanced manufacturing technology has become increasingly appealing for a range of industries. however, it remains a challenge to infuse experiential learning experience in advanced manufacturing in undergraduate curriculum and to enhance undergraduate design and research experiences to meet both societal needs and the growing job-market demands. Here at the University of the District of Columbia (UDC), the District of Columbia's only public institution of higher education, and a historically black college and university (HBCU), it has recently modernized its undergraduate curricula in engineering with an undergraduate concentration in Advanced Manufacturing to meet that need. This paper presents a case study of implementing experiential learning through a series of collaborative Capstone Design projects that are collaboratively advised by project advisor and external subject-matter experts. Specifically, the subjects include Additive Manufacturing and Nanotechnology with applications in Energy, Manufacturing, Aerospace and many other fields. Further, this paper will also discuss and present the assessment data from the author's experience and provide suggestions and lessons learned from this practice to help the broader community of engineering education.