Using Research projects in the classroom to improve Engineering education

Engineering schools and colleges have the challenge of training engineers for the future, who, in addition to excel in the discipline's own technical skills, must be innovative and capable of working in a globalized and changing economy. The scenarios that are glimpsed, require the engineer to have specific competences that must be developed in their training process.Proposals such as the 2020 engineer suggest, among other things, that engineering education must be transformed to help achieve the vision and to develop innovations in, hitherto, unknown fields for engineers. Higher education challenge in engineering is to train students to become modern and effective engineers capable of participating and leading conception, design, implementation and operation of systems, products and projects. For this, the students must not only be prepared technically, but also be socially responsible and have the capacity to be innovating permanently. Modern engineering projects require a combination of several disciplines, so engineering schools must incorporate them into existing programs and through activities outside the classroom.Additionally, research as the basis of teaching and training allows the teacher to leave aside the role of passive mediator between theory and practice. One of the methodologies for carrying this out is the classroom research project with students. This didactic strategy aims at producing changes in the professor's paradigms, passing from passive methodologies to active and constructivist pedagogical practices in the classroom.This paper presents the experiences of the professors of the College of Engineering and Basic Sciences of Politécnico Grancolombiano using research projects in the classroom. They show that altering classroom situations encourage meaningful learning for students, supports quality education and foster on the professors the development of, among others, pedagogical, technological and communicative, competences.Some research projects done by students in their in the classroom are: Crutches designed with a weight dampening system in the technical design area; Technical requirements for the design of a food packaging in the industrial engineering program; Electronic Menu (Each table has a tablet that shows the different liquors offered, the customer has the possibility to select the desired one, as well as to make mixtures, at the end the client sends the order, which is received by the person in charge to then be delivered to the client) in the systems engineering program; The manufacture of: Artificial snow, beer, aromatic candles, glue made from gasoline and polystyrene and copper sulfate crystals in the chemistry area; Work in conjunction with the subjects of simulation and stochastic programming to develop a holistic view on the processes in the industrial engineering program, among others.This paper describes the approach, development and results of research projects used by professors in industrial engineering, systems engineering and systems management technology programs. It shows that the integration of curricular strategies, educational, methodological and evaluation, allow to transform not only classroom practices and academic programs, but also the processes of curricular, teaching and research management. In this way, the professional development of teachers, pedagogic management and the research capacity of the Faculty is strengthened.