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Abstract
All engineering freshman at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) are required to complete the course “Engineering Design and Innovation”. The course, commenced in 2006, provides students with learning opportunities in design, communication and teamwork. Each year, over 1,000 students combine lectures in design theory and communications skills with a hands-on design project. Ten of the schools in the Faculty of Engineering offer design projects as part of the course. The first project offered by the School of Petroleum Engineering was involved designing a “mini sucker rod pump”. In recent years the School offers a project on CO2 sequestration – which has broader appeal and relevance to students across the faculty. Despite students’ enthusiasm to win the design contest, the aim of the course is to build skills rather than a device.

In this paper, we highlight the innovative approaches to demonstrating CO2 injection taken by UNSW first year students. We also evaluate the teaching and learning outcomes from this project. All teams worked together to design and build their device and to document their experience. However, some teams collaborated more effectively than others. We quantified this effectiveness using an online peer assessment tool that enables students to rate the performance of their team mates. We incorporated these ratings into the assignment of individual marks for group assignments.

We analyse the marks students achieved for various assessments and components of the course. We find that female students tended to out-perform their peers in both individual and team assessments. We also find that students who did well in individual components of the course also did well in the team components. We find it is hard to use early assessments to predict performance in later assessments. There is a strong connection between students’ results for their Design Proposal and their results for the Final Design work. We are able to show a statistically significant improvement for marks for presentations but not for report writing. We also found that there is an improving trend in marks over the semester. Having surveyed students, we find that 90% of students were satisfied with their experience of the course. Students found this course to be challenging and fun, giving them a good start in developing their skills as engineers.

Course Design
Our aim in teaching “Engineering Design and Innovation” is that students might be introduced to the principles of, skills used and methods applied in the practice of engineering design. In addition to this, we aim to for the students develop skills and experience in professional communication and team-work.

The teaching strategy we take is for learning to occur in the context of the design project. Lectures are designed to either instruct students in the technical knowledge or introduce the skills required for the successful completion of the project. We expect students to then apply this knowledge in the project. They develop communication skills by having to talk and write about their project. By being part of a project team, they learn team-work skills. By having to build a device within a timeframe and under constraints, they gain experience in design, project management, time management and construction. They learn to think-ahead about problems that might arise, develop contingency plans and trouble-shoot – all important skills in the practice of engineering.