How to study for this course!

1. Amount of work per week

Balancing the course load is vital to academic success. Here are some guidelines on how to balance your time in this course. College courses are measured in credit hours. For every one credit hour in which you enroll, you will spend approximately two to three hours outside of class studying. Therefore, to help determine the course load most appropriate for you, use the formula:

3 credit hours (1 course) = 3 hours in class per week => 9 hours study time per week.

12 credit hours (4 courses) = 12 hours in class per week => 36 hours study time per week.

ENGR 10A is a 2-credit course, which means that you should be spending between 6 hours per week just for this class.

2. Course Goal: To enhance your success as a student, engineer and person.

To achieve this goal the curriculum of this course is divided in four parts:

(a) Weeks 1-2 we will introduce some general tips on how to be successful at anything you pursue. We will see how to stay motivated throughout our academic careers.

(b) Weeks 3-5 we go over what is the engineering profession and what do engineers do. As part of this section of the course we have an Interview Project, where you have the opportunity to ask the advice from working engineers!

(c) Weeks 6 - 10 is all about taking your education in your own hands. We go over tips on how to become self-reliant learner, how to create your own road maps to transfer to 4-year colleges, and we briefly discuss ethics. As part of this section of the course we have a an Essay Project, where you will create an strategy on how to become a "World-class Engineering Student"!

(d) Weeks 11- 16 will cover in detail the Engineering Design Process. We will learn the basics about 3D CAD drawings, prototyping and presentations. We will use this new skills in our a design project!

3. How to use the book

First of all, this is not a typical science/math textbook. You will not have to memorize anything from the textbook! The book that is full of practical information to help you grow as student. Therefore we will be using the book as a tool to support our learning process. The book contains a lot of really helpful information not only for this class but for your entire college career. As you go over the chapters in the book, you will see that the author presents Reflection Boxes. Take the time as you read the book, to stop and think how the advise from the books applies to your personal life. The more you reflect on the contents on the book, the more useful the book will be.

4. Your Grade

In this course there is no examinations. There is two major components to your grade:

(a) Homework (30%): A total of 13 homework assignments that are due weekly on Monday at midnight. Only the best 12 out 13 HW count towards your final grade. The homework will be graded based on completion and coherence.

(b) Interview Project (15%): due Friday Oct 30th.

(d) Design Project (30%): Due Friday Dec 18th.

(e) Extra Credit (5%): Earn extra credit by interacting with your classmates on CANVAS discussion that will be posted throughout the semester.

5. Office Hours: Thursday 1:30 PM - 2:30 PM

I will really like to get to know each student personally! If you can not make it to the official office hours, send me an email and we can find a time that works for you. You will notice that this is class is NOT content focused, but more of class that provides guidance. So why you should attend office hours? Well, office hours is the time to talk about your career, you can ask me anything you want to know and I am happy to help you forge a formidable career.