Courses
Turn the Lights On! Professional Development
This is an online professional development course for CISTAR's Turn the Lights On! curriculum. The curriculum and PD have been developed by the Center for Innovative and Strategic Transformation of Alkane Resources (CISTAR), an NSF funded Energy Research Center (ERC) and the INSPIRE Research Institute for Pre-College Engineering . The CISTAR Pre-College Education objectives are to stimulate interest in engineering careers at the middle and high school levels and to strengthen pathways to promote the participation of female and URM students in engineering at the college level.
About CISTAR
The Center for Innovative and Strategic Transformation of Alkane Resources, CISTAR, is one of the flagship Engineering Research Centers (ERCs) funded by the National Science Foundation. ERCs bring together industry, academia, and government to cultivate engineering discovery and education in research areas critical to our nation’s strength. ERC’s infrastructure integrates four pillars: research, engineering workforce development, industry and innovation, and diversity & culture of inclusion, with industry partners being paramount to center success. CISTAR is a coalition of five collaborating institutions comprising of Purdue University, University of New Mexico, Northwestern University, University of Notre Dame, and The University of Texas at Austin.
About the Turn the Lights On! Curriculum
In this unit, students are taught mathematical and scientific concepts related to electrical energy and renewable resources through an engineering design challenge. At the outset of the unit, students are introduced to power generation and the client, the members of Indiana Office of Energy Development, who need to determine a new power generation system that will effectively reduce contamination of chemical releases in the environment. Students use what they know about electrical energy and renewable resources to develop a strategy to test for electrical power generating systems. Finally, students write a letter, including their designs and design justifications, to pitch their experimental design to the client.
STEM connections
|
Science Connections |
Technology & Engineering Connections |
Mathematics Connections |
|
Chemical and physical changes Kinetic and potential energy Variance energy Electrical energy Ecosystem and biodiversity Renewable and non renewable resources |
Complete full engineering design process, including problem scoping (define and learn about the problem), solution generation (plan, try/build, test, decide about a solution), redesign, and communication of final design to client. Use of measuring instruments such as anemometer, thermometer etc.
|
Proportional reasoning Representing graphics and analyzing diagrams Collecting and representing data
|
Overarching skills that students will learn:
-
Maintaining an engineering design notebook
-
Teamwork
-
Communication
-
Data analysis
-
Iteration