PeopleMover: an example of interdisciplinary project-based education in electrical engineering

Author

Daems, Walter ; De Smedt, Bart ; Vanassche, Piet ; Gielen, Georges ; Sansen, Willy ; De Man, Hugo

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng., Katholieke Univ., Leuven, Belgium

Volume

46

Issue

1

fYear

2003

fDate

2/1/2003 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

157

Lastpage

167

Abstract

In this paper, the authors present an interdisciplinary design project that was introduced into the electrical engineering curriculum as an example of project-based education. Within the project, students design and implement an autonomous rail system intended for people transportation from system specifications down to a fully working system including hardware and software. The educational assets and drawbacks are discussed as well as the practical issues of setting up a large educational project. The current state of the project and an overview of future improvements based on student feedback are highlighted as well.

Keywords

electrical engineering education; project engineering; railways; PeopleMover; autonomous rail system design; autonomous rail system implementation; educational assets; electrical engineering curriculum; hardware; interdisciplinary project-based education; people transportation; software; student feedback; students; system specifications; Analytical models; Computational modeling; Computer errors; Consumer electronics; Education; Electrical engineering; Hardware; Mathematics; Seminars; Software;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Education, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0018-9359

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/TE.2002.808229

Filename

1183680