Background | Implementation | Student Performance | Reflections | Comments

Implementation

Students were assigned a limited number of nontraditional style homework sets and two exams. Other components are the Journal Club and two special projects.

Open-Ended Homework: Most traditional engineering homework problems have one solution. Perhaps different pathways can be used to achieve that solution, but still there is often just one correct final answer. However, there is no one correct solution in design, just some answers that are better than others based on the defined design parameters. Since this biomaterials course was approached from a design/use/material perspective, open-ended problems provided a natural method to solicit discussion of the issues surrounding use of specific biomaterials in specific applications. I introduced open-ended problems in the homework sets gradually; i.e., a simple, more straightforward problem statement was presented in the first homework set and more complicated case scenarios were given in later sets. I believe the gradual build-up of skills in approaching open-ended problems was beneficial to the teams as they developed their interactions, plus it was not too intimidating to the students who had never been exposed to such questions. The open-ended homework format also helped prepare the student teams for the final project.

Journal Club: In the Journal Club, groups of three to four students each read and evaluated an up-to-date journal article on a field of biomaterials appropriate for the current section of study, which was assigned by the professor. The group members then critiqued this article in terms of its merit for both science and potential applications. The groups shared their analyses with the entire class through an oral presentation.

First Project: Reverse engineering of a medical device—In the first project, students were each given a medical device similar to what a hospital would receive and use. Each student was asked to "reverse engineer" the device; i.e., to determine why the device was packaged, labeled, designed, etc., in that particular manner. The student examined the biomaterials compatibility, device function, cost, FDA guidelines, and marketing elements, followed by an analysis presentation in both written and oral formats.

Second Project: Phase I NIH SIBR proposal—The second project began when I taught students how to search the medical literature to find articles on their specific subject of interest. Each student then found at least five peer-reviewed journal articles with a common connection to that subject. They could also use one book as a reference. The next step was to write a literature review of the subject matter only as it related to the articles used. The review had to include critiques of the science and potential application of the work. This material led into the creation of a NIH Phase I SBIR Proposal. The students delivered their work via the submission of a term paper and a presentation of the concepts to the entire class.

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