Innovative modern engineering design and rapid prototyping course: A rewarding CAD/CAE/CAM experience for undergraduates

This paper presents a new undergraduate design course in the Department of Aeronautics and Astronautics at MIT. This course combines design theory, lectures and hands-on activities to teach the design stages from conception to implementation. Activities include hand sketching, CAD, CAE, CAM, design optimization, rapid prototyping, and structural testing. The learning objectives, pedagogy, required resources and instructional processes as well as results from a student assessment are discussed.