Capstone Students Can Begin Projects in Spring Semester
The students of Team 24508 approach the work site where they are doing structural analysis of pillar stability at the University of Arizona’s San Xavier Underground Mining Laboratory. Photo: Erik Amundsen
Not all engineering seniors presented their completed Interdisciplinary Capstone projects at the Craig M. Berge Design Day held April 29. Eight teams made up of 43 students instead began their projects in January and will finish them in December.
The required year-long course that students take while working with teammates on the capstone, Engineering 498, is the last class engineering students need to take to graduate.
In the past, students with alternative graduation schedules have had to take an extra semester to complete their degree requirements, since the class was offered exclusively in the fall. But now, students are saving both time and money with the new timing option.
Rodger Elkins, an adjunct lecturer of SIE, is teaching the first ENGR 498 class that began in the spring, allowing students to start their capstone course in January as opposed to August.
Elkins’ class hosts students from various engineering concentrations – even mining students, who generally have their own capstone course.
“They don’t have an out-of-sequence class like this one, so we’ve got some mining students and a mining project,” Elkins said.
Elkins’ students are working on projects throughout the calendar year that will be presented in December at an event similar to Design Day.
“We anticipated having four to six projects – we’ve got eight,” Elkins said.