Developing Electrical Engineering Course in an Active Cooperative Learning (ACL) Platform

The Department of Electrical Engineering plans to run one of its basic courses, Introduction to Electrical Systems and Computation (EE 206), in Active Collaborative Learning (ACL) format. We have surveyed and examined several alternatives and flavors of running ACL, in an attempt to customize a platform that best achieves the course objectives. Issues related to team formation, team management and team assessment were debated. A survey of similar courses in other leading universities was conducted. The authors had the opportunity to test parts of the proposal in their running courses during the phase of the new course development. The feedback and lessons learned were incorporated to make adjustment and fine tuning to the proposal. The course is divided into four modules: Introducing EE fields, Project I: Research Activity, Matlab, and Project II: Robotics. In drafting the pilot course material, we did every effort to provide the fine details so that instructors feel comfortable with the approach. A complete set of documents has been developed to run the course in a productive and engaging manner.