AVIT

 

Students in Tom Talley’s senior design course in electrical engineering at Texas A&M are required to develop a project design. This usually involves building a working prototype. Among the kinds of projects Talley suggests students might undertake are some that qualify as volunteer service projects in the community. Students are not paid for such work; in fact, they may have to pay for needed materials themselves. Since these projects are undertaken as a service to others, it is expected that every effort will be made to bring them to successful completion. Since this might involve more work and time (perhaps even beyond the current semester) than other possible projects, what reasons might a team have for selecting a volunteer service project?

 

Analysis

This is a situation that presents opportunities for what we have call good works (Chapter 5). Despite the common complaint that today’s youth is a "me-generation," student volunteer work is on the rise. Many campuses have an office that provides students with a list of volunteer opportunities in the community. However, for most students, volunteer work bears no special relation to their academic work or professional preparation. Tom Talley’s class provides ways of making the connection.

One project in particular illustrates the value of such opportunities. Undecided about what project to undertake, one team decided to work with the Brazos Valley Rehabilitation Center after Tom Talley showed them a letter from teacher Ellen Wood that indicated some of the center’s needs. The specific task the team undertook was to design and build an Auditory Visual Tracker (AVIT). An AVIT is used to evaluate the training of visual skills in children with disabilities. On learning about the project, Ellen Wood commented that the center had wanted an AVIT for years but had been unable to afford purchasing one, adding: "This is a tremendous boost in working with children with disabilities ages 0-3. The opportunity of obtaining the AVIT is a dream come true."

The team successfully completed the project, but only by continuing to work on it after the end of the semester. Another design team did a follow-up project for the center during the next semester. In addition to helping the Brazos Center, team members themselves seem to have gained much from the experience. Team member Robert Siller commented, "We liked that it was a project that was going to be genuinely used. It wasn’t going to just end up in a closet. It’s actually helping someone." Team member Myron Moodie added, "When we presented the AVIT to the center we got to see some of the kids use it. It was worth it watching the way children like it."

Tom Talley suggests that a key was team members meeting some of the children: "The students met the children who were going to be using the project and fell in love. They worked day and night. Money couldn’t buy you that kind of effort." He concludes, "They clearly went above and beyond--that’s Aggie spirit. Someone is going to get some fine engineers."

Most engineers do not have the opportunity to interact in this way with those who ultimately benefit from their work. For those who benefit, their benefactors are anonymous. Nevertheless, knowing that one’s work benefits others one will never meet can be quite satisfying, even without special recognition.

Tom Talley by no means stands alone in encouraging engineering students to undertake volunteer work related to their academic work. The Worcester Polytechnical Institute and Case Western Reserve University, for example, have well established programs to encourage this. Dwayne Breger, Civil and Environmental Engineer at Lafayette College, has organized a team of students from engineering, biology, and environmental science to design a project that would provide renewable energy sources for the college. Steven Silliman, Civil Engineer at Notre Dame University, involves students in service projects in Latin America. No doubt there are many other equally impressive examples.