Electronic content development for engineering distance learning

Global engineering teams must work across borders and cultures while applying best practices. To distribute these practices globally, distance learning and online electronic methods can be employed to provide engineering courses where none were traditionally available before. The technology can also be used to increase engineering enrollment by partnering with schools that cannot provide an accredited engineering program. Course availability can now reach minority, foreign, and non-traditional students, who might otherwise not have access to an engineering education. The School of Engineering & Computer Science of Baylor University, in conjunction with the Texas Engineering and Technical Consortium and partner colleges, has started deployment of the introductory engineering courses in a distance learning form. This paper describes the development of electronic content for the second semester course "Introduction to Engineering Analysis. This paper presents the selection of technologies and the methods by which the actual content was prepared. Beta testing and student feedback were employed to make modifications to the presentation methodology and content. The most significant lesson learned is that the student cannot be expected to work in isolation, but must be mentored on a regular basis. Other lessons learned and future application conclude the paper.