Application of data acquisition in undergraduate engineering education

This paper describes how the engineering college of Christian Brothers University (USA) has determined that the application of integrated data acquisition systems should be included in the education of all engineering majors as early as possible; therefore, these systems are introduced to students in the sophomore year along with other instrumentation topics such as sensors and transducers. Students are then required to use this knowledge in upper division laboratories and design projects. By the time the students graduate, they have been exposed to various types of data acquisition systems from manufacturers such as Allen-Bradley, Hewlett-Packard, Tektronixs, and Omega. The combination of three years of experience and exposure to different types of systems produces graduates who thoroughly understand the capabilities and limitations of integrated data acquisition systems. This understanding allows them to effectively utilize these systems after they graduate