AC 2012-5102: UNDERSTANDING THE SYSTEM: SUSTAINABILITY PROJECTSINCREASE STUDENT INTEREST AND LEARNING

Dr. Noel E. Bormann P.E., Gonzaga University

Noel E. Bormann is a professor and Chair, Civil Engineering Department, School of Engineering andApplied Science, Gonzaga University, Spokane, WA 99258.

Dr. Mara London, Gonzaga UniversityMr. Andrew Douglas Matsumoto, Gonzaga University

School of Engineering

Ms. Melanie Ruth WalterMr. Spencer Joseph Fry

c©American Society for Engineering Education, 2012

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Understanding the System: Sustainability projects increase student interest and learning

Abstract Throughout Africa, population growth has caused enormous strain to the natural and constructed environment. Throughout the world, there is increased attention on the importance of developing sustainable solutions to urgent and interrelated problems of society. Students in all disciplines need effective and robust education in sustainability, and that requires an increased understanding of global systems. Developing useful skills through the application of sustainability principles to engineering topics is a challenge, let alone understanding and applying agricultural, energy, legal, political, cultural, biological and economic sustainability concepts. For engineering students and educators to meet this challenge requires a commitment to spend additional efforts in project activities. Student efforts expended and the resulting outcomes from a project-based learning capstone design course are considered. The project titled “Integrating Improved Sustainable Technologies into the Heart of the Home-the Kitchen” focuses on delivering improved sustainable technologies to homes in rural Africa and is funded by the US EPA P3 (People, Prosperity and the Planet) Program. The project team is comprised of a total of five faculty members and five student team members from civil engineering, mechanical engineering and engineering management (with a business emphasis), who are interested in the application of sustainability. This project systematically integrates technologies used in African kitchens that can improve the health of families (especially women and children), and at the same time reduce resource consumption. Student deliverables include: (1) An improved ceramic water filter that uses less clay material and require less fuel to fire in a kiln. These improvements reduce deforestation. (2) Investigation of the performance of corn stover bio-fuel pellets when used as a cooking fuel. Use of this bio-fuel also reduces deforestation and improves watersheds. (3) Evaluation of using thermo-electric cells powered with waste heat from cooking fires to ventilate harmful smoke with high particulates concentrations from the kitchen. (4) The key project goal was to develop a project implementation plan that focuses on overcoming potential economic, educational and cultural obstacles to implementation and suggests ways in which the technologies developed by the team can be successfully adopted in rural Africa. The challenging project requirements are observed to increase the efforts expended and overall time spent by the team members on the project. The greater effort required from students is believed to reflect a greater student interest in the successful completion of the project and appears to improve the student learning outcomes related to sustainability.

1 Introduction There is a growing understanding that the solutions to the significant problems facing society require that a systematic evaluation of the many dimensions of a problem be undertaken before acting. The frequent occurrences of significant unintended consequences in complex engineering projects are indicators that often an engineered solution did not properly incorporate an adequate understanding of the system. There is a surging dissatisfaction with the recognition that much of

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the serious environmental degradation of the past five decades was caused by action taken by well educated people that had well-intended goals. A quick example would be the contamination of drinking water wells with methyl tertiary-butyl ether (MBTE). The oxygenate MBTE was introduced into gasoline formulations to reduce air pollution, but has been found to have properties that made groundwater pollution more expensive to cleanup, when storage tanks leaked. A 2005 estimate of cleanup cost for MBTE contaminated public water wells was in the range 25-85 Billion dollars.1 Many other more egregious examples of imperfect understanding have become common news stories that most readers are somewhat familiar with. This is not to imply that perfect understanding is possible, or that without perfect understanding no action should be taken, rather it is to emphasize that a broader understanding of sustainability problems could reduce harmful impacts from any action. Such improved understanding will require improved education with an appreciation of system-wide effects. The recognition of a need for effective education caused the United Nations General Assembly to declare 2005-2014 the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development. UNESCO is the UN agency leading efforts to implement this declaration:

“The overall goal of the Decade of Education for Sustainable Development is to integrate the values inherent in sustainable development into all aspects of learning to encourage changes in behavior that allow for a more sustainable and just society for all. The basic vision of the DESD is a world where everyone has the opportunity to benefit from education and learn the values, behaviour and lifestyles required for a sustainable future and for positive societal transformation. This translates into five objectives, to:

• Give an enhanced profile to the central role of education and learning in the common pursuit of sustainable development;

• Facilitate links and networking, exchange and interaction among stakeholders in Education for Sustainable Development;

• Provide a space and opportunity for refining and promoting the vision of, and transition to sustainable development – through all forms of learning and public awareness;

• Foster increased quality of teaching and learning in education for sustainable development;

• Develop strategies at every level to strengthen capacity in Education for Sustainable Development”.

“The concept of sustainable development continues to evolve. In pursuing education for sustainable development, therefore, there must be some clarity in what sustainable development means and what it is aiming at. This plan presents three key areas of sustainable development – society, environment and economy with culture as an underlying dimension. P

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• Society: an understanding of social institutions and their role in change and development, as well as the democratic and participatory systems which give opportunity for the expression of opinion, the selection of governments, the forging of consensus and the resolution of differences.

• Environment: an awareness of the resources and fragility of the physical environment and the affects on it of human activity and decisions, with a commitment to factoring environmental concerns into social and economic policy development.

• Economy: a sensitivity to the limits and potential of economic growth and their impact on society and on the environment, with a commitment to assess personal and societal levels of consumption out of concern for the environment and for social justice”.

• The values, diversity, knowledge, languages and worldviews associated with culture strongly influence the way issues of education for sustainable development are dealt with in specific national contexts. In this sense, culture is just not a collection of particular manifestations (song, dance, dress, …), but a way of being, relating, behaving, believing and acting through which people live out in their lives and that is in a constant process of change”. 2

UNESCO’s formulation of three realms involved in understanding sustainability issues is echoed in the catchwords of the USEPA P3 Program: People (social realm), Prosperity (economic realm) and Planet (environmental/science realm).3 This paper uses the experience of the five students in this one particular sustainability focused project to explore differences that students perceive for the effort required to complete a project and the perceived educational outcomes for projects that deal with traditional civil and environmental senior capstone design projects relative to projects that are focused on sustainability. The sustainability focused project that the students completed is entered in the US EPA 9th Annual P3 Awards: A National Student Design Competition for Sustainability Focusing on People, Prosperity and the Planet. The project is sited in Kenya and integrates sustainable technology to improve sustainable development targeted towards women and children in the home. The hypothesis submitted is that challenging sustainability projects that ask students to tackle important complex and inter-related real-world sustainability issues more fully engage the students. As a result, these students are more motivated to participate in a deep learning experience and devote additional time to the project. These conditions create a more satisfying overall learning experience.4

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2 Traditional senior capstone design projects The senior engineering and computer science students in this program all complete a required two-semester senior capstone design class that forms an integral component of effective engineering and sustainability education. Each project team is organized as a separate section of the senior design courses, and normally is comprised of a faculty advisor, a sponsor liaison, and between three and five students. The capstone experience deepens the student learning and is based on the concept of “problem based learning” (PBL). This recognizes that the diverse skills required of modern engineers cannot be learned solely in a classroom or from a textbook. Design skills are best learned through a combination of observation, emulation, analysis, and experimentation. This demands a high degree of interaction between the student and experienced designers. The interpersonal skills required in successful engineering projects are best developed by using team work in realistic but “safe” conditions. Industry leaders in effective engineering design learned more than a decade ago that the give-and-take process that characterizes a functioning, well-motivated team is a key element to a project’s success. In the Center for Engineering Design and Entrepreneurship (CEDE), the capstone design course sequence is supported in an organized setting where students interact with the sponsor (industrial or public entity) and the academic faculty. Project teams of three to five students each address a unique project, with guidance of an advisor and sponsor liaison. For a project team the students, advisor(s) and liaisons may come from different academic disciplines. Students are assigned to projects based on their stated interests which are expressed in a project qualifications survey completed by each student at the start of the academic year, and which also summarizes the students’ unique knowledge and experiences. Team members must make effective use of available resources to perform and manage the project activities to meet schedules and requirements. By working on a real-world problem, each student has the opportunity to make decisions, to work as part of a team, and to interact with professionals in the private and public sectors. Furthermore, working on technical projects that have a real value (in contrast to a faculty “assigned” project) to business, non-profits, and the government encourages students to acquire important new skills and to not treat the exercise as a standard homework. At the end of the spring semester, student design teams present their projects and reports, and demonstrate models and prototypes. Industrial sponsors, faculty members, members of the CEDE Design Advisory Board, prospective students, and members of the university community are invited to attend the event and to interact with the project teams. Evaluation of the project success is partly based upon the presentations made by the student team.

3 Sustainability focused capstone design project example : “Integrating Improved Sustainable Technologies into the Heart of the Home - the Kitchen”

This project was completed within the CEDE framework, sponsored by the US EPA, and is entered in the 9th Annual P3 Awards: A National Student Design Competition for Sustainability

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Focusing on People, Prosperity and the Planet. The US EPA P3 projects are focused on sustainability issues with a variety of topics; however, all of the P3 projects undertaken in our program have been located in Africa. These projects have every characteristic of the more traditional projects, and in addition contain other complex issues to deal with. This increased complexity requires students accept a higher workload with more demands to deadlines and a variety of logistical challenges.5 The project used in this present publication is located in Kenya. Many areas in Africa are undergoing rapid growth and as a result there has been a significant increase in the number of people who live in the peri-urban zones that connect urban areas and farms in surrounding rural areas. In this boundary zone, the insufficient urban infrastructure does not meet critical health needs. Potable water, sanitation, and energy requirements must be satisfied if the families are to move towards a sustainable future. The project goal is to develop an innovative integration of sustainable technologies that address a household’s immediate health needs by focusing on activities in the kitchen, and to increase the perceived value of the project results.6 Support for this challenging project is provided by NGO partners in Africa who assist the students in understanding other cultural settings, and thereby increasing the sustainability of the project goals.7 The components of this particular project are to:

a) Develop a prototype of a simple ventilation system that improves indoor air quality by using thermoelectric (TE) cells, driven by waste heat from the cooking fire, to energize a 12-volt battery charging system and power a small fan in a duct. Energy produced that is not required for ventilation can be stored in a battery for lighting, charging a mobile phone, or other needs.

b) Develop and test an improved ceramic filter geometry based on the Filtron filter. The improved filter requires less fuel per filter to fire the kiln, reduces production breakage, and simplifies shipping on local roadways.

c) Examine the use of corn stover bio-fuel pellets as a cooking fuel in typical Kenyan cooking applications.

d) Thoughtfully integrate outputs from objectives a through c above, and apply implementation methods using entrepreneurial resources so that the women can be empowered as agents of change to promote adoption of these technologies into daily activities in the kitchen.

Objective (a) is important because women who prepare food commonly have young children with them at the cooking hearth. The majority of cooking in the developing world is still done by burning wood or charcoal. Smoke from burning fuel-wood exposes children and women to fine particulates that negatively impact their health. Also, the cost of burning fuel-wood reduces

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the economic prospects of the family. An appropriate system to vent smoke from the kitchen will directly improve health and prosperity.

Figure 1. Smoke Present in a Kitchen in Kitale, Kenya (Zimmerman-SWEF, 2009)

Objective (b) is important because an unacceptable proportion of homes in Africa, and throughout the developing world, do not have reliable access to clean water. Women are commonly responsible for providing the household water where infrastructure is limited. The work of hauling water also is often undertaken by the children in the family. Drinking water storage, including water used for cooking, is typically located in the kitchen. The Filtron ceramic pot water filter designed by Potters for Peace is an effective method to remove 90%-99% of bacterial contamination, and is produced in facilities all over the world. Production of the Filtron is complicated by the size and geometry of the filter; it has a tall shape with pronounced bends that promotes production losses due to cracking and slumping. Because of the volume occupied by each Filtron, the kiln in which they are baked holds relatively few units.

Objective (c) is important because corn stover bio-fuel is carbon-neutral because the local maize fields are typically burned at the end of every harvest and use of the pellets could reduce the consumption of fuel-wood in the home. P

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Figure 2. Filtron Filter (Earth Awards)

A filter shape that is flatter and seals against the walls of the bucket while still effectively removing water-borne pathogens that is developed in this project may prove to be a superior design. A flattened shape allows a larger number of filters to be produced with each firing of the kiln, which in-turn reduces the amount of fuel-wood consumed and, thus, increases sustainability of filter production. A flattened shape also will simplify the shipment of completed filters and reduce the breakage of filters during shipment, improving the sustainability of production.

Figure 3. Rendering of new filter geometry design. Elmenhurst, 2011.

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Objective (d) is important because without a careful and usable project implementation, all of the project concepts developed will not be helpful to the people in Africa. The project team uses the experience garnered from previous projects completed in Africa to most effectively present the integrated technologies to the women in Kenya. NGO partners in Kenya have provided a reliable source of “on-the-ground” information and useful insight and information that will be used to prepare the operation and maintenance materials appropriate for the adopters.

4 Measures of student interest and effort In the past eight years the CEDE has completed eighteen projects directly dealing with sustainability, out of approximately 66 total projects. Student input from more than two years in past was difficult to elicit, so in the preparation of this publication the decision was to treat one recent project as an illustrative case study. This allowed student input to be collected reliably and to have the project conditions to be more clearly remembered by the students.

All five of the student team members responded in narrative fashion to the following twelve questions.

Q1. Describe the level of interest you feel for the project in 2-3 sentences.

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) Having a project with a sustainability focus created added complexity and challenge that I found interesting. Creating a product using materials commonly found in Africa provided the added challenge of attempting to determine what materials were readily available. While this certainly added time on to the overall project, it allowed us to create a filter that was more efficient and had a greater chance of being implemented.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) My level of interest in this project is extremely high; not only because it allows me to get my first look at a senior project and what they are all about, but also because I believe that what we are developing could do great good in Kenya and other third world countries.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) I had strong interest and hoped to be selected for this project to not only cultivate my own engineering skills, but to do so on a project I felt could be beneficially to others at important basic levels—levels such as clean air and water.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The project has several attributes that hold my interest, but others that are disinteresting. The goal of improved quality of life is encouraging, but the actual scope of our work and the lack of professional guidance lower my interest. P

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(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) I have been to Africa previously via study-abroad. I was more than intrigued to be working on a project that is directly relevant to this region of the world again. My time spent in Africa, while brief, did change my perspective on many things completely. This being said, my interest for this project could not get any more deeply rooted.

Q2. How important was sustainability issues in your interest?

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) Having a sustainability focus was one of the primary reasons I wanted to participate in this project. It is an incredibly rewarding feeling to know that your solution can exist for many years.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) Overall sustainability issues would not have been my first choice for a project, but after having worked on the project it changed my perspective and made me realize that sustainability issues are central worldwide, especially with the millennium goals upcoming and needing to be met.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) When selecting my top three choices for senior design projects at the beginning of fall semester, the EPA P3 project stood out the most for several reasons. This project contains three different design aspects that are interrelated and will be brought together through a business/implementation plan. The involvement of working with students of other engineering majors while trying to develop innovative and sustainable solutions in a third world country had a challenging appeal along with being rewarding as well. I initially thought very little of the sustainability issues involved with the project, but almost immediately found sustainability to be one of the most important points. With the greatest ideas and designs, if they are not sustainable, there is little point in introducing them to the developing country in question.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Sustainability interests me very much, because developing sustainable technology will provide health and security for generations.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Sustainable technologies are, in my opinion, the most valuable technologies to invest any amount of time and resources to. Especially in the world of today when faced with rapidly diminishing resource pools, sustainability has become paramount. My personal interests and beliefs coincide with this train of thought.

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Q3. How important was the location of the project in a developing country for your interest in your project? (as a separate consideration from the sustainability issue).

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) The location played a minimal role in my interest in this project. I would have still wanted to work on this project if it had been set in an entirely different part of the globe.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) The location of the project was not very important to me especially in regards to its sustainability issues. As long as the products we are developing go towards helping people, then where the project takes place is not of that much importance to me.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) Living in a country where these basic types of need are often taken for granted, the opportunity to design specific items for use in a third world country was also an important deciding factor in choosing my top three projects.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The fact that the project focuses on health and sustainability in developing countries increased my interest. It is good motivation to know that a successful project will improve the lives of families in Africa, rather than just go towards the profit of a company.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Developing countries can only effectively make use of technologies that are fundamentally simple in the first place. Generating less complex solutions to some of the same problems we face globally has been very rewarding, and being able to work on a project that is directly targeted at a developing nation has been perfect.

Q4. How important was the incorporation of the EPA P3 Design Competition for your interest in your project?

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) Being a part of the EPA P3 Design Competition was a big draw for me. Having "idea validation" in the form of EPA funding suggested to me that others in the scientific community were intrigued in this project idea.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) The EPA P3 Design Competition is what originally struck me and got my interest level to be where I wanted to be involved with this project and has held my interest during the process.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) IT was a big issue. The EPA P3 Design Competition is a chance to demonstrate why our project deserves the phase II grant, enabling our designs and ideas to become reality. This aspect of our senior

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design project is different from our peers. The design competition adds a level of pride that other projects may lack. Although most of the projects at our university do have a real world application associated with them, this project incorporates a hands on approach that goes beyond engineering. It deals with the involvement of sustainability, a business/implementations plan, multi-disciplinary collaboration, and healthy competition for possible continuation funding.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The incorporation of the EPA P3 sustainability competition was not a large factor in my interest of the project.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The element of competition added to this project has really done nothing more than to boost personal motivation. The end result is a system that will improve the quality of life for the target recipients: the idea of doing this so well that there is potential for a competitive victory has made it a little more fun.

Q5. When you discuss your project with other teams, and in presentations etc., how would you describe the level of interest of your peers in their own projects?

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) I think this really varies from person to person. People who are working on projects that closely relate to their desired career path are very excited by their projects, but those who weren't matched with a project that was their top choice seem to be less interested.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) My peers seem to be very interested in their own projects and seem to enjoy working on their projects as well. Albeit, I have not had a lot of interaction with many other groups, the ones I have seen seemed quite interested in their projects.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) It varies with the project.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) When discussing projects with friends, I do not see much evidence of enthusiasm or interest.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The people that I have spoken with are either very excited about their project or indifferent.

6. How would you describe the interest of other project team members in your project? Do your peers have a view of your project that is different than the view of their own project?

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) Other teams seem to be very interested in this project. While much of that stems from having a lot of work accomplished on

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the project and having EPA funding, many people are genuinely interested in how were are addressing these problems.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) Others interest in my project has seemed to be nothing more than cordial. Because everyone has their own project to work on and is just as busy, no one that I have noticed has been extremely interested. Since others have not put as much time and effort into this project, they seem to view our project as interesting, but often miss some of the small things, something that no one can fault them for due to them being unaccustomed to the project to begin with; whereas, with their own projects, I am sure my peers would feel the same way when discussing how I view their projects.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) Members of other senior design projects find the design competition of particular interest, and in my experience, it seems to be the one aspect other project wish they had.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Members of other teams are interested in our project, but not any more than they are in any of the other project. They do have a different view of our project because of its unique nature.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Most of the people that I have spoken with find out project interesting, but some point out the lack of extensive mechanical engineering.

7. How would you describe the interest you have in other projects.

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) I am incredibly interested in some of the other environmental engineering projects. I am considerably less interested in the projects that are non-environmental.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) Although I am interested in other projects, because I haven’t taken the time to do all the research and experience what it takes to come up with the same ideas, often my perspective might be a little skewed compared to those who actually worked on the project. My interest in other projects is probably a little different than most of my other peers because I am often looking at the projects as ideas for next year and future projects; whereas many of my peers might take a look at the projects in a more reflective light as everything that they have accomplished in their time here at Gonzaga.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) For the reasons that I chose this project, I have a higher interest in my project than in other groups’ projects.

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(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) I am not very interested in most other projects compared to my own. Other projects have little to give motivation or provoke interest.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) I personally find this project to be very rewarding, and I cannot see any other project being more interesting than this.

8. Describe the workload you have experienced in your project. What fraction of the workload is associated with addressing the issues of sustainability? What fraction of the workload is related to the engineering technology issues (size, materials, testing, performance, etc.) What fraction of the workload is related to the P3 competition issue of your project?

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) I'm not sure I can provide a percentage breakdown, but addressing sustainability and engineering technology issues takes up the bulk of my time related to this project. Certainly the engineering component is important to solving the problems we were presented, but we are routinely asked to recall the "sustainability parameter" to ensure that we can implement our engineering work.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) The workload that has come with this project can be broken up into the three categories of addressing sustainability issues, engineering technology issues, and P3 competition issues roughly 15 percent, 60 percent, and 25 percent. A majority of our time has been spent addressing the physical issues and what needs to be done relative to these issues. The rest of our time has been spent between figuring out sustainability issues and how these would affect our products, and the work that comes with the P3 competition.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) There is a higher workload for this project. The additional deadlines and workload associated with preparation of the EPA P3 design competition is not required of other senior design projects. I personally view these deadlines as another milestone to keep us on track with the progression of the project. A large portion of the beginning of our project was spent brainstorming ideas on how to make our designs sustainable while maintaining an adequate amount of efficiency. This focus of sustainability is always on the forefront and is continually being incorporating at all stages of the project. The larger part of fall semester and that of spring semester was, and is being spent on the building and testing of prototypes.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The workload of this project is heavy, because of the amount of trial an error involved, and the many facets that

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need addressing. Almost all of my work is related to engineering technology issues. Very little of my work is solely related to sustainability or the competition, because what starts out as a sustainability issue soon evolves into an engineering technology issue.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The workload for this project has been moderate at times, heavy at others. I would estimate 30% of the time involved was dedicated to sustainability, 60% to engineering technology issues, and 10% to P3 competition work.

9. Describe your understanding of the workload for other project teams in relative terms to your project.

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) This also varies based on the project. There are some projects where team members put in only a few hours a week and some where team members could be doing upwards of 8-10 hours a week.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) From what I can tell other people’s workloads on their projects has been relatively the same as ours. The work is split into differently categories obviously, but the amount of time that others have spent seems to be roughly the same as our group.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) It varies but I think the general workload is less for others.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Other projects seem to have a lighter workload than ours. The narrow scope of most other projects does not provide the load that ours does. However, other projects could have greater complexity. Without having personally been involved with other projects prohibits me from accurately gauging the respective workloads.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) The other teams’ members I have talked to have all described their workload as about the same as my own.

10. Describe your understanding how other teams view the workload you have faced in your project.

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) Other teams seem to believe that this project is the most time consuming and complex.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) As for how other teams view our workload, I believe they see it as roughly the same. Most groups seem to think that everyone does roughly the same amount of work on each project.

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(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) Our peers think we have a higher work requirement, but they also see that as a trade- off with having the opportunity to compete at a national level.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Other teams’ members recognize that the broad scope of our project could translate to a lot of work, but they could not accurately gauge the respective workloads without being more closely involved.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) Other teams’ members feel that our workload is similar to that of their own.

5 Student learning experience Two of the questions that the students responded to dealt with the perception of the learning experience. The questions attempted to gather descriptions in their own words of how the project achieved the broad goals of learning engineering design in a PBL situation.

11. Are you satisfied with the educational experience provided by your project?

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) Thus far, yes, but the jury is still out until after the EPA P3 judging.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) The experiences that I have had up to this point on this project are invaluable. Many people do not get the chance to work on a project of this magnitude their junior year and being a part of something like this is definitely an experience that cannot be made up in any other way than to actually do it.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) The project is gives us a glimpse of real world issues and experiences.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) I am satisfied with the educational experience. Our actual results are not ideal, but the whole process has done much to provide experience working on projects.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) I am very satisfied with the educational experience, namely the opportunity to work with other engineering students in another discipline than my own.

12. How would you compare your educational satisfaction with other project teams, based on informal interaction and public presentations?

(Student 1- Male, Senior Civil Engineering) I believe that my satisfaction level is probably higher than most of the other students involved with senior design

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projects. For me, satisfaction comes from being able to address a challenging problem in an area of engineering that I am extremely passionate about.

(Student 2- Male, Junior Engineering Management, Business Minor) Compared with other people I think that my experience has been more fulfilling than most. Because I did not expect to be a part of this project this year I think that my educational experiences and satisfaction surpass many of my peers and other team members.

(Student 3- Female, Senior Civil Engineering) The educational experiences my project team has had cannot be fairly compared with those of our peers. Each senior design project has a different end goal with widely different challenges associated with each. I am of course interested in the different projects my peers have. There is curiosity and often times jealousy that goes along with listening to my peers discuss their own projects, but these feelings are then reversed when I talk of mine.

(Student 4- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) From the limited information I have regarding the other projects, I think the educational value has been similar for us all.

(Student 5- Male, Senior Mechanical Engineering) I think that our educational experience has been one of the better ones, all things considered.

6 Conclusions and recommendations for future projects Review of the narrative responses to the ten background questions and the two educational satisfaction questions reveals high consistency between questions when similar information was requested in different ways.

The majority of the students have high interest in the project, high interest/importance in sustainability, had an increase of interest/importance related to the location in developing country, and found the EPA competition to increase the interest/importance in the project (summarizing questions 1through 4).

A majority of these students found no strong interest expressed by other students in those projects the other students were working on. This appears to set a base-level signal to use when comparing descriptions of interest (summarizing question 5)

A majority of the student team members perceived that other students in other projects had a higher interest in this project than other projects, and that their own interest in this project was higher than the interest in that they have in other projects (summarizing questions 6 and 7). P

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The perception of workload is interesting but less clear. Students for all 11 separate projects in the Civil Engineering projects of CEDE are asked to record time spent on senior design projects, but those time records are spotty and unreliable due to having not all teams record the data contemporaneously and having the records kept by different members of each team throughout the academic year. However, a majority of this team perceived that the workload for their own project was greater than that of other students’ projects, and in addition they perceived that the other students felt this project had a higher workload (questions 8 and 10). However, there was not a majority of these students who perceived that others workloads were less than their own. Responses indicate that 2 felt others had lower workloads, 2 felt others had the same workload and 1 felt the variation made it difficult to determine (question 9). This appears to represent that the estimates of higher workload made for this project have a viable basis in the perception of the students’ evaluation, since there is no apparent bias or feeling of “poor me” (question 10). It appears sustainability focused projects sponsored by the EPA P3 program offer more challenge. Observers may perceive sustainability projects to contain a higher workload. Due to increased interest and satisfaction this higher workload is felt to be acceptable. Students appear to be willing to devote more effort to projects that offer either more challenge and/or external validation of project concepts and results, such as in the EPA P3 competition.

For student perception of educational satisfaction there is unanimous agreement that this project provided a satisfying learning outcome (question 11). One response was conditioned on how well the projected was evaluated in the EPA judging.

A majority of the students felt the educational satisfaction was higher for this project than for other projects. Higher satisfaction is related to interest in this sustainability project. It appears that students who had low interest in this (type of) project would have a lower satisfaction in the results, and would presumably also devote less effort to its completion.

All of these results are of course conditioned on the nature of this information. All these responses are based on perception, rather than carefully crafted and benchmarked survey instruments. However, with due regard to the nature of the data, useful information is presented.

Use of complex, real-world projects in the competitive setting of the EPA P3 program has positive results when students evaluate the nature of the learning and the satisfaction they feel with completing the project.

Future projects will be undertaken in a manner to amplify the positive results observed in this example project.

7 Bibliography [1.] AWWA Water Utility Council, A Review of Cost Estimates of MTBE Contamination of Public Wells URL.

http://www.awwa.org/files/Advocacy/Govtaff/Documents/AWWA_MTBECostEstimates_06202005.pdf June 21, 2005 accessed Jan. 6, 2012.

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[2.] United Nations, UNESCO URL. http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0014/001486/148650E.pdf accessed Jan 5, 2012.

[3.] US EPA. URL. http://www.epa.gov/ncer/p3/. Accessed Jan. 11, 2012 .

[4.] Warburton, K., Deep learning and education for sustainability. International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, 2003. 4(1): p. 44-56.

[5.] Wolcott, M., Brown, S., King, M., Ascher-Barnstone, D., Beyreuther, T., and Olsen, K. (2011). “Model for Faculty, Student, and Practitioner Development in Sustainability Engineering Through an Integrated Design Experience.” ASCE Journal of Professional Issues in Engineering Education and Practice, 137(2): 94

[6.] Creating a ‘‘values’’ chain for sustainable development in developing nations: where Maslow meets Porter, Walsh, P. R., Environment, Sustainability and Development. (2011) 13:789–805.

[7.] Scott, W.; Gough, S. Sustainability, Learning and Capability: Exploring Questions of Balance. Sustainability 2010, 2(12), 3735-3746.

Acknowledgements This publication was made possible by USEPA grant SU835088. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the grantee and do not necessarily represent the official views of the USEPA. Further, USEPA does not endorse the purchase of any commercial products or services mentioned in the publication. The authors also acknowledge the indispensable work completed by the project partners in Kitale, Kenya. 

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