Chemical Engineering Teaching in COVID-19 Times: Successfully Adapting a Capstone Design Course to a Remote Format
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Nadia G. Khouri [1] ; Michelli Fontana [1] ; Igor L. R. Dias [1] ; Maria R. W. Maciel [1] ; Rubens Maciel Filho [1] ; Adriano P. Mariano [1]
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[1] University of Campinas, Brazil
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- Localización: Journal of chemical education, ISSN 0021-9584, Vol. 98, Nº 12, 2021, págs. 3794-3803
- Idioma: inglés
- Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
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Resumen
The coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic required educational institutions to adapt face-to-face to remote teaching. This study reports the experience in the first semester of 2020 for a Chemical Engineering Capstone Design Course at the University of Campinas in Brazil. In this course, senior year students develop a group project, in which they simulate a chemical plant and evaluate its technoeconomic feasibility. In 2020, the groups were proposed to design a process to replace diesel fuel from the bus fleet in Campinas city with renewable fuel DME. Because of the pandemic, several adaptations were needed: the theoretical classes became asynchronous, group meetings were online, a commercial simulator was replaced by an open access one, and the schedule was extended by 2 weeks. Despite that, the students had a great performance, comparable to face-to-face. To assess student satisfaction, a questionnaire was used. The course met the expectations of most of the students who also recommended keeping it in the remote format or merging it with face-to-face teaching. Therefore, these changes made it possible to apply new teaching dynamics and tools that could be used in the future to improve the course quality.
