First-Year Project-Based Engineering Design Courses in Canadian Institutions

First-year engineering design courses are fundamental component to most engineering programs, and they provide the backbone for the introduction of engineering students to engineering practice and profession. First-year engineering design courses are also essential to begin the development of an engineering mindset. The purpose of this study is to complete a comparative examination of first-year engineering design courses across Canada. The work was inspired by an interactive workshop delivered at CEEA-ACEG 2022. The workshop was based on a comparative examination of the curriculum and delivery of three first-year design courses at different engineering institutions, including number of students and credits, project types, content integration, resources, and logistics. Informed by the discussion in the workshop, this study expands on the work by surveying instructors of first-year engineering design courses. The preliminary results are presented from a subset of the data collected and demonstrate similarities and differences among the different programs. These results provide a foundation for meaningful analysis and discussion of educational practice in first-year engineering design courses.