An Interdisciplinary General Education Capstone Course Intersecting Art and Engineering Design

Engineering design and art typically have minimal collaboration beyond industrial design, and architectural principles, and historically form follows function. The idea of 'should function follow form?' presents a challenge to engineering designers. To address this idea an integrated general education capstone course is developed that intersects artistic design principles with engineering design. The course is co-taught by engineering and art department faculty members using project-based learning and delivery is through a lecture-studio model. Students from all majors across campus enroll, these have included students from engineering, art, as well as the social and natural sciences and humanities which presents challenges for instruction and pedagogy. Structurally, the course is divided into three scaffolded projects beginning with an individual project, followed by pairs, and the final project being a team of three or four students, respectively. Students work in broad-based interdisciplinary teams, applying hands-on experiential learning to solve complex problems. Student design solutions focus on effectiveness of function, and creativity in problem solving. Aesthetic and design goals consider societal, industrial interests and/or needs. Presentation of the overall course structure, the projects and examples of student work is given. Comments on what the instructors learn from co-teaching a course outside of their disciplines is presented to aid in future interdisciplinary design course development.