Engineering concepts and communication

Together the Departments of Engineering and English at the University of Denver designed and implemented a course that sustains freshman enrollment in engineering while teaching engineering design and fundamental communication skills by integrating the goals of two formerly separate courses: Expository Writing and Engineering Concepts 1. The link did not detract from the original goals of these courses nor stress the limited time resources of the participating faculty. We found that the design quality, technical ability, and CAD competency increased significantly, while improvement in the students´ written skills exceeded our expectation. The engineering link produced English classes whose exit essay exams averaged scores in the top 9% of all university freshmen