The University of Wisconsin-Platteville will host a virtual Senior Design Open House on Wednesday, Dec. 16, offering engineering students the opportunity to showcase their capstone projects to students, faculty, industry representatives and the general public.
The Senior Design program pairs student groups with industry sponsors to solve real problems or create new products. The students are supervised by an industry and faculty advisor while they explore all aspects of the project – from creative development and project management to engineering ethics, product safety, copyrights and patents, robust engineering and more. The open house will feature projects from more than 130 students in the disciplines of mechanical, industrial and software engineering.
“This semester has forced us to get creative,” said Dr. Jessica Fick, associate professor of mechanical engineering and senior design coordinator. “While meetings and discussions have been on Zoom, teams have still been able to get on campus and use the shops, labs and meeting spaces to complete their projects. It is exciting to see the projects coming together as we go into the final stretch of the semester. Students are working in the shops, in their garages and basements, or wherever else they are most comfortable.”
This semester’s industry sponsors include Sub-Zero Wolf, Amcor, Milwaukee Tool, Spectrum Brands, Trane Technologies, AVISTA, Weasler Engineering, Klauer Manufacturing and Realityworks. Projects are diverse, ranging from developing a calf throat molding process and hydrographic printing to working on an oven hinge system, a height adjustable wheelchair and more.
“Even though the hybrid learning has forced us to work harder to connect with each other, we have made some strides in bringing faculty and students from different disciplines together,” said Fick. “This semester, students from mechanical engineering and industrial engineering shared the same lectures while having a faculty mentor in their discipline. This allowed for flexibility in the teams and for a number of interdisciplinary teams.”
Presentations will be hosted via Zoom. Visit www.uwplatt.edu/senior-design for a full schedule of presentations and to register to attend.