Summer Advising Notes available

I put a pdf copy on the web of the notes from the group advising session I ran early this month. You can find it from several places in my TCC web pages. The best starting point is

http://faculty.tcc.fl.edu/scma/carrj/Engineering/

I cleaned up the PowerPoint notes I had prepared for the meeting so they addressed some common questions students had, and then "printed" it to a pdf file with six slides per page. It can be read OK if printed out, but it is best read by zooming to about 200% while viewing it on a computer.

There is additional information, including info about scheduling classes, in the page identified as "Pre-Engineering advising notes".

Contact me at my TCC address if you have any questions.

Engineering Advising Meeting

I had a very productive meeting with about a dozen students interesting in becoming engineers. Once I clarify a few details in the PowerPoint file I used as an information resource during the meeting, I plan to make a pdf copy of it available on the web and announce it here in this blog.

I'd be happy to answer any questions this summer, and I expect to repeat this session as a program at the TCC "STEM Center" this fall. Watch for announcements on campus.

Please stop by my office (SM 290) or e-mail me (carrj -at- tcc.fl.edu) if you are interested in pre-engineering advising or joining the Engineering Club.

FSU ADVISING DAY // 9.24.08

YOU CAN "CLICK" ON THIS FLYER TO ENLARGE IT.

DRESS CODE for POWER PLANT TOUR THURS. SEPT. 18.

Safety and Dress Code:

The Hopkins Power Plant is an operating power plant.

Please do not wear shorts or loose fitting shirts.

Shoes must be closed toe preferably leather.

If you have a hard hat and safety glasses, please bring them, as the plant has a limited number.

FSU X and Y Requirements

FACULTY recently received the following communication from our Administration. This may be important information for Engineering Students ---

We had a student inquiring about FSU’s X and Y requirements so Bruce from FSU provided me this link that I wanted to share with all just for a better understanding of the requirement.  I will also post the link out on the Academic Advising portal  under the Student Support Tab.  (In the future, we plan to develop an advising portal piece for students for information such as this.)

For TCC students planning to transfer with an AA degree, they will only have to meet one X or Y requirement before graduating from FSU.  They do not have to complete it here but for some majors (e.g., Engineering and Business) it is highly recommended that they take one of our courses to meet that requirement because there are no options in those majors at the junior/senior level (per Bruce at FSU).  The TCC courses that will satisfy either the X or Y multicultural requirement for FSU are identified on the AA Planning Guide.

Go to http://studentsfirst.fsu.edu and hit the Check Course Requirements link (second one on the academic information box)

VISIT THE ENGINEERING CLUB FORUM

Here is a link to the new forum for the club.
http://www.tccengineeringclub.com/forum/index.php

You will want to visit the forum often, as that is
where many interesting Engineering Club topics
will be reported, including Aaron's report on the
last meeting (02/15/08) and the status of all the
club's on-going activities.

DJ.

How To Do an Engineering Problem

George Heller, shown at left, is an alumnus of TCC and a current student in the Mechanical Engineering department of the FAMU-FSU College of Engineering. He is also a blacksmith.

George is acting as the liason between TCC and the FSU ASME chapter this year, so he attends most club meetings. He will gladly share what he has learned there, as he did last week.



Information presented at the 20 April meeting:

Before the meeting even began, George shared one of the things he learned this semester: How to do a problem, engineer style. He was pleased to point out that some of the steps are ones he learned in my class, but his real point was that a correct answer would not be given full points if it was found while skipping some steps that a physicist like me will normally omit. That may be why he was laughing.

Side comment: I suspect he never took a class from Doug Jones. Students who have taken a class from Doug Jones will understand this comment, although even Doug does not emphasize some of those points because they rarely appear in math problems.

The image above is clickable, but the one below might be more readable. The point he emphasized the most was step 1. There is no explicit penalty for not reading each word (emphasis added by George in the original), but you might get zero for a problem if you miss a key adjective or participle. A careful, close reading of each problem is crucial, and might be a point I will emphasize in the fall.

I already emphasize step 2, primarily as a result of past conversations with engineering faculty about what weaknesses students bring with them from physics classes. George added that you would lose 5 points if the right pictures are not drawn, and drawn well, whether your answer is right or not. Turning words into pictures is as important as turning words into equations (which are steps 3 and 4). He added that you would lose one point for each given value you did not specify (with units) in step 3, and lose a point if your specification of the equations was incomplete in step 4.

Steps 5, 6, and 7 (what students correctly consider "solving" the problem) should be automatic by the time you get out of TCC, so you will get the right answer if you do the first parts correctly. That is, in fact, the reason for the emphasis on the work that has to be done before you can "solve" the problem.

Finally, a point will be taken off if you do not box your answer.



Thanks, George!