Engineering students spend years building the foundational knowledge they
need to solve real problems. Some of their most valuable lessons come when
they get to put that knowledge to work. For students in one high-level
mechanical engineering class, that meant finding out whether what they had
learned could keep a model plane airborne.
MEM 425: Aircraft Design is an elective course that introduces students to
the principles of aerodynamics and the mathematics behind aircraft
performance. During the final weeks of the course, students put those
concepts into practice by designing the wings and tail of a
remote-controlled model aircraft to meet specific performance requirements.
In August, they took those designs out of the classroom and onto Elwyn Field
in nearby Media, Pennsylvania, where veteran model airplane enthusiasts from
the Propstoppers RC Club helped put the finished aircraft through their
paces.
For senior Lauren Wadie, the experience gave her a new way think about what
she’d learned in class.
“The hands-on component… made me go back into the lectures to make sure I
could explain why our calculations made sense and why what my group did
worked,” she said. “It's easier to learn when you can do something tangible
that can reinforce theories and concepts.”
That feedback loop between theory and application is central to what makes
experiential learning valuable in engineering. Classroom lessons give
students the foundation they need to try something in practice, while
hands-on experience gives them new context, questions and insight to bring
back to the classroom.
The lessons can also follow students even further beyond the classroom, into
co-op and extracurricular activities. For MEM junior Monica Buzzanca, a
member of Drexel’s Formula SAE team, this includes the design of a race car.
“[F1 cars] all have wings with airfoils like airplane wings do, and they
generate lift and drag. It all kind of directly applies,” Buzzanca
explained. “I’m not even part of the aerodynamics subgroup of the build
team, but I can understand what’s happening here thanks to this class."
That ability to make connections across different problems becomes
increasingly important as students move through the curriculum and into
Senior Design. In the yearlong capstone, students are expected to draw on
knowledge from across their engineering education to tackle an open-ended
problem. Ehiremen Ebewele, PhD, assistant teaching professor, said that the
course helps build that readiness by strengthening students’ proficiency in
tools like MATLAB, a high-level programming platform.
As Drexel transitions to a semester-based academic calendar, he also sees
room to expand the aircraft project and give students more opportunities to
experiment on and refine their designs. New investments in demonstration and
laboratory equipment could create similar opportunities for hands-on
learning in aerospace engineering, robotics, thermal fluid sciences and
other areas. More chances to build, test and to learn what works and what
doesn’t.
For junior Youchen Pan, that process was one of the most valuable parts of
the MEM 425 experience. Starting a design from scratch gave him the chance
to see an idea through, evaluate the result and make changes based on what
he learned.
“We designed something, it didn't work, and then we updated it,” Pan said.
“That’s what engineering is, isn’t it?”