WHAT CONSTITUTES A MULTIDISCIPLINARY CAPSTONE DESIGN COURSE? BEST PRACTICES, SUCCESSES AND CHALLENGES.

This paper reflects on how to practically achieve the necessary organizational and curricular preconditions that allow for conducting Multi􀀀Inter􀀀and Trans – disciplinary engineering capstone design industry􀀀sponsored projects and thereby serve engineering graduates better. The differences between offering multidisciplinary and the common singledisciplinary capstone design courses are also highlighted. Simultaneously, this paper focuses on the key challenges that aggravate the smooth implementation of such a complex undertaking the fundamental goal of which is to offer a multidisciplinary team-based design project work experience to the Students that would be mimicking as close as possible an analogue typical industrial setting. Possible remedial measures for overcoming these challenges are also discussed. A new multidisciplinary capstone design project course offered at the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering (FASE) at the University of Toronto in the 2013/14 academic year (“APS 490Y Multidisciplinary Capstone Design”) coordinated by Prof. Kamran Behdinan served as the basis for this work.