Work in progress — GOING GLOBAL: An innovative course for sophomores

Twenty-first-century engineers will be practicing their profession in an increasingly globalized world. The changing nature of engineering practice calls for accompanying relevant changes in engineering education. In partial response to this imperative we have developed the course GOING GLOBAL. The course is part of a recently re-designed curriculum for our Applied Engineering Science undergraduate major, a broadly-based cross-disciplinary program in the College of Engineering. The primary audience for the course is engineering sophomores. In this paper we describe our goals for the course, the current course design and implementation, and course impact on learning outcomes from our experiences in fall 2008 with twenty students and in fall 2009 with forty students. Anecdotal data suggest that the learning goals are being met effectively.