Engineering education

Electrical Apparatus, Jun 2006 by Hoff, Joseph

As summer heats up and students are turned out of doors, it is time once again to look at engineering education.

Vocational Training. Imagine interviewing twelve candidates for a job within your company-only to find that each of them is lacking the qualifications for the job. Tom Geoppinger, president of Matlock Electric in Cincinnati, had such an experience recently, prompting him to reach out to young people in order to equip them with the skills necessary to succeed in the job market.

Although there are many white collar jobs, the exportation of manufacturing jobs has put a squeeze on the local labor market in Cincinnati, which has a higher level of unemployment than the national level. According to Geoppinger, several factors have contributed to the high level of unemployment, including the scarcity of qualified people in the area and the presence of people who once worked for automotive companies and are unwilling to work.

In response, Cincinnati is restarting the vocational program, and Geoppinger is involved with a cooperative that trains.

"Two days a week, I spend two hours tutoring in a junior high school," says Geoppinger, who works for the Cincinnati Youth Collaborative, a program that provides tutoring and mentoring for students in need.

He spends a total of four hours per week in the Cincinnati Public School System, where he helps students pass the state test for proficiency. Students take the test from elementary through nigh school.

"I have taught both mathematics and reading," explains Geoppinger.

Geoppinger has worked with eight- and nine-year-olds. He typically works with sixteen- and seventeen-year-olds and has met students who reached junior high school still unable to read.

"We were looking for a person to bring in as a trainee," says Geoppinger.

Chemical engineering. Dr. Victor Ugaz, an assistant professor in the Artie McFerrin Department of Chemical Engineering at Texas A&M University, is working to miniaturize a DNA lab so that components needed for DNA analysis are available in a tiny lab-on-a-chip about the size of a business card.

Ugaz has worked out a novel scheme to perform the series of reactions that allow scientists to copy the often trace amounts of DNA for analysis. In a paper in the March 28 issue of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, Ugaz and Ph.D. student Eaisal A. Shaikh have retreated a step: isolating and concentrating small amounts of DNA that would otherwise be difficult to analyze.

In the paper, entitled "Collection, Focusing, and Metering of DNA in Microchannels Using Addressable Electrode Arrays for Portable Low-Power Bioanalysis," Ugaz and Shaikh present their scheme for concentrating and focusing a minute sample of DNA in tiny spaces called microchannels.

The scheme involves placing a series of small electrodes at set intervals along the bottom of a microchannel. A DNA sample is injected into the channel and a small voltage (1 Volt) is applied across the first pair of electrodes in the series. Because opposites attract, the negatively charged DNA migrates toward the positively charged anode and accumulates there, making it possible to "catch" the DNA sample. Switching off the voltage and reapplying it between the second and third electrodes will then "release" the DNA, allowing it to be collected at the third electrode.

By repeating this sequential catch-and-release process, the DNA concentration can be progressively increased. Labeling the sample with a fluorescent dye allows the stepwise increase in concentration from electrode to electrode to be observed directly. After enough catch-and-release steps have been performed to raise the concentration to a desired level, the collected DNA can then be dispensed and used to perform a variety of analysis tests. All of this occurs on a device the size of a business card.

Standards. Engineers designing products know they must comply with certain formal standards if what they produce is to be used, but few engineering students know much about these standards. The IEEE hopes to change that with educational materials about standards that it put on the Web earlier in the year. The objective is to impart information about standards to university students, faculty members, and just about anyone else who might be interested.

So you want to be an engineer? Parents and high school students in the Philadelphia area got a glimpse of life as an undergraduate engineering student when the IEEE held an event in December called "So You Want to be an Engineer."

Drexel University hosted the meeting, which drew 160 attendees, who listened to students and university personnel explain the broad field of engineering. Visitors also got answers to their curriculum questions, and they had a chance to build simple devices. Attendees interacted with students and personnel from Drexel, Lehigh, Pennsylvania State, Temple University, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Education Partners. IEEE members seeking to enroll in continuing education programs can look to IRRR Education Partners Program, which offers classes, seminars, and graduate degree programs, online or on campus at a 10% discount. The educational institutions in the program have been evaluated and found to meet the criteria set by the IEEE Educational Activities Board.