More Like this

1. Multi Institutional Collaboration in Additive Manufacturing: Lessons Learned

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--34987  

   Littrell, Michael ; Chitiyo, George ; Fidan, Ismail ; Cossette, Mel ; Singer, Thomas ; Tackett, Ed. ( June 2020 , Proceedings of the 2020 ASEE Annual Conference)

   One of the fastest growing fields in the broad field of engineering is Additive Manufacturing (AM), also known as 3D Printing. AM is being used in many fields including, among others, design, STEM, construction, art, and healthcare. Many educational institutions however, do not have the requisite capacity and resources to effectively educate students in this area particularly when it comes to rapid transition from design to small-volume level production. A coalition of several higher education institutions under a National Science Foundation (NSF) funded Advanced Technological Education (ATE) Project has been working towards providing educators with the skills and material resources to effectively teach their students about 3D printing. The ultimate beneficiaries are high school and post-secondary students and include those in vocational fields. Before and during Fall 2019, Train the Trainer Studios (TTS) were conducted to train instructors, drawing participants from many institutions across neighboring states designed to provide hands-on instruction to participants. In addition, Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC) and webinars have also been made available to all participating instructors and other collaborators to openly share the information being generated through this ATE AM coalition. Evaluation of the TTS revealed many positive results, with the participants sharing many successmore »stories after implementing the learned concepts at their institutions. From the evaluation findings, participants were largely satisfied with the delivery and quality of instruction they received from all the TTS presenters, with almost all of them, in all instances, indicating that the training they received would be useful in their programs. The current paper and proposed presentation will report on the lessons learned through this process, including sharing some of the success stories from the instructors and their students.« less
2. Hands-On Simulations to Demonstrate Manufacturing Paradigms

   McCorkle, Milinda ; Wingerter, John ; Thompson, Patricia ; Aqlan, Faisal ( January 2020 , Proceedings of the 2020 IISE Annual Conference)

   With the rise in manufacturing jobs in the United States, companies are having a difficult time filling the job openings for skilled production workers. It takes an average of two months to fill these positions. This study is designed to introduce the fundamental concepts of manufacturing and demonstrate these concepts through hands-on simulation of the different manufacturing paradigms. The paper is the result of the authors’ participation in a six-week NSF RET program at Penn State Behrend where high school and community college educators worked together to develop curriculum for high school students. Lesson plans, handouts, and required material lists were developed and tested. Surveys conducted after the simulation experiment provided improvements for the exercise. The simulations were then implemented in high school classrooms to improve the awareness of manufacturing among high school students and develop their technical and professional skills. By understanding the evolution of manufacturing and becoming aware of the need to gain advanced skills required for today, students will be encouraged to consider pursuing careers in manufacturing.
3. Assessing the Results of an Additive Manufacturing Course at Three Large Universities on Undergraduates and High School Students

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--32475  

   Maloney, Patricia A ; Cong, Weilong ; Zhang, Meng ; Li, Bingbing ( June 2019 , 2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition)

   Additive manufacturing (AM) is prevalent in academic, industrial, and layperson use for the design and creation of objects via joining materials together in a layer upon layer fashion. However, few universities have an undergraduate course dedicated to it. Thus, using NSF IUSE support [grant number redacted for review] from the Exploration and Design Tier of the Engaged Student Learning Track, this project has created and implemented such a course at three large universities: Texas Tech (a Carnegie high research productivity and Hispanic Serving Institution), Kansas State (a Carnegie high research productivity and land grant university) and California State, Northridge (the largest of all the California State campuses and highly ranked in serving underprivileged students). Our research team includes engineering professors and a sociologist trained in assessment and K-12 outreach to determine the effects of the course on the undergraduate and high school students. We are currently in year two of the three years of NSF support. The course focuses on the fundamentals of the three families of prevailing AM processes: extrusion-based, powder-based, and liquid-based, as well as learning about practical solutions to additive manufacturing of common engineering materials including polymers, metals and alloys, ceramics, and composites. It has a lecturemore »plus lab format, in that students learn the fundamentals in a classroom, but then apply and broaden their knowledge in lab projects and independent studies. Additionally, as outreach, we host field trips from local high schools during which the undergraduates give presentations about discrete AM skills, then lead the high school students through a lab project focused on those skills. This creates a pipeline of knowledge about AM for younger students as well as an opportunity for undergraduates to develop leadership and speaking skills while solidifying their knowledge. We are also in the process of uploading videos and lab projects to an online Google Classroom so that those with access to 3D printers in other areas can learn online for free. We are also self-publishing an accompanying textbook and lab manual. Beyond the course itself, one of the innovations of our project is the assessment strategy. For both undergraduates and high school students, we have been able to collect content area knowledge both before and after the class, as well as information about their attitudes towards engineering and self-efficacy beliefs. This has been particularly illuminating in regards to subgroups like women and students of color. Our research questions include: i) what is the knowledge growth about AM during this course? ii) does this differ by university? iii) does this differ by gender or race? iv) what are the best ways to make this course portable to other universities? Preliminary results indicate a statistically significant improvement in knowledge for all students. This was particularly true for women, which may indicate the promise of AM courses in decreasing the female dropout rate in engineering. Attitudes towards engineering and self-efficacy perceptions also differed after the class, but in varying ways by demographic subgroups and university. This will be explored more in the paper.« less
4. Long-Term Outcomes of RET Programs on Female and Minority Student High School Graduation Rates and Undergraduate STEM Major Rates (Fundamental)

   Nichol, C. ; Crawford, C. A. ; Barr, C. ; Cerda, I. ( January 2021 , ASEE Annual Conference proceedings)

   Research Experience for Teachers (RET) programs are National Science Foundation (NSF) funded programs designed to provide K- 12 Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) teachers with immersive, hands-on research experiences at Universities around the country. The NSF RET in nanotechnology encourages teachers to translate cutting-edge research into culturally relevant Project-Based Learning (PjBL) and engineering curriculum. Traditionally, the evaluation of RET programs focuses on the growth and development of teacher self-efficacy, engineering content knowledge gains, or classroom implementation of developed curriculum materials. However, reported methods for evaluating the impact of RETs on their female, minority student populations' high school graduation and undergraduate STEM major rates are limited. This study's objective was to compare RET high school student graduation rates and undergraduate STEM major rates across gender, race, and ethnicity to a comparison sample to determine the RET program's long-term impact on students' likelihood of pursuing STEM careers. The approach of collecting and analyzing the Texas Education Research Center Database (EdRC) data is a novel methodology for assessing RET programs' effectiveness on students. The EdRC is a repository of K-12 student data from the Texas Education Agency (TEA) and Higher Education data from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB). This jointmore »database contains demographic, course registration, graduation, standardized testing, and college major, among others, for all students that attended a K-12 public school in Texas and any college in Texas, public or private. The RET program participants at Rice University (2010 – 2018) taught numerous students, a sample size of 11,240 students. A propensity score matching generated the student comparison group within the database. Students' school campus, gender, race/ethnic status, and English proficiency status were applied to produce a graduation comparison sample size of 11,240 students of Non-RET participants. Linking the TEA database to the THECB database resulted in college STEM participants and comparison sample sizes of 4,029 students. The project team conducted a logistic regression using RET status to predict high school graduation rates as a whole and by individual variables: gender, Asian American, Black, Caucasian, and Latinx students. All models were significant at p less than 0.05, with models in favor of students RET teachers. The project team conducted a logistic regression using RET status to predict student STEM undergraduate major rates as a whole and by individual variables: Gender, Asian American, Black, Caucasian, and Latinx students. African American and Caucasian models were significant at p less than 0.05; Gender, Asian American, and Latinx models were marginally significant (0.05 less than p greater than 0.1), where RET students had higher STEM major rates than matched controls. The findings demonstrate that RET programs have a long-term positive impact on the students' high school graduation rates and undergraduate STEM major rates. As teachers who participate in the RET programs are more likely to conduct courses using PjBL strategies and incorporate real-world engineering practices, female and minority students are more likely to benefit from these practices and seek careers utilizing these skills.« less
5. A chunk-based slicer for cooperative 3D printing

   https://doi.org/10.1108/rpj-07-2017-0150  

   McPherson, Jace ; Zhou, Wenchao ( November 2018 , Rapid Prototyping Journal)

   Purpose The purpose of this research is to develop a new slicing scheme for the emerging cooperative three-dimensional (3D) printing platform that has multiple mobile 3D printers working together on one print job. Design/methodology/approach Because the traditional lay-based slicing scheme does not work for cooperative 3D printing, a chunk-based slicing scheme is proposed to split the print job into chunks so that different mobile printers can print different chunks simultaneously without interfering with each other. Findings A chunk-based slicer is developed for two mobile 3D printers to work together cooperatively. A simulator environment is developed to validate the developed slicer, which shows the chunk-based slicer working effectively, and demonstrates the promise of cooperative 3D printing. Research limitations/implications For simplicity, this research only considered the case of two mobile 3D printers working together. Future research is needed for a slicing and scheduling scheme that can work with thousands of mobile 3D printers. Practical implications The research findings in this work demonstrate a new approach to 3D printing. By enabling multiple mobile 3D printers working together, the printing speed can be significantly increased and the printing capability (for multiple materials and multiple components) can be greatly enhanced. Social implications The chunk-based slicingmore »algorithm is critical to the success of cooperative 3D printing, which may enable an autonomous factory equipped with a swarm of autonomous mobile 3D printers and mobile robots for autonomous manufacturing and assembly. Originality/value This work presents a new approach to 3D printing. Instead of printing layer by layer, each mobile 3D printer will print one chunk at a time, which provides the much-needed scalability for 3D printing to print large-sized object and increase the printing speed. The chunk-based approach keeps the 3D printing local and avoids the large temperature gradient and associated internal stress as the size of the print increases.« less