USE OF THE PROJECT BASED LEARNING APPROACH IN ENGINEERING STUDIES: FROM CLASSICAL TUITION TO ACTIVE LEARNING

The use of active learning methodologies to enhance students' participation, to develop abilities such as initiative promotion, autonomy, determination and to improve the tuition quality is being progressively established in the learning programs of the degrees offered in the University of the Basque Country (UPV-EHU). This institution is strongly encouraging the use of these teaching strategies after the interesting results obtained with their use in other learning programs. This way, professors are receiving courses to become comfortable with these new forms of tuition. In this work, the design of a subject of the Renewable Energies Engineering Degree following the Project Based Learning Approach is presented. The studies of Renewable Energies Engineering are a four years' degree in which a balanced combination of core and specific subjects structures the learning program. Specific knowledge in hydraulic, photovoltaic, solar thermal, geothermic, biomass or wind energies, energy efficiency and saving methodologies as well as electricity generation, distribution and storage are some of the expected competences to be achieved by the students.