Restructuring an undergraduate mechatronic systems curriculum around the flipped classroom, projects, LabVIEW, and the myRIO

Two courses in the undergraduate systems, measurements, and controls (SMAC) curriculum in mechanical engineering at Purdue University were redesigned to better engage with students and to provide for greater hands-on learning opportunities. A flipped lecture structure was adopted and the course topics were restructured to better facilitate an intuitive grasp of systems and controls. The laboratory activities for the course were restructured around the National Instruments myRIO device and the LabVIEW programming language. Projects were incorporated in the class to give students the opportunity to apply knowledge to open-ended automation and control problems. A comparison of the new and old curricula using course surveys as well as interviews with students from both curricula currently engaged in senior design projects was performed to better understand the impact that the redesign has had on undergraduate SMAC education at Purdue University.