Student generated course demos

Actively engaging engineering students in classroom instruction often results in project-centered activities. Generally these projects are selected because of student interest or topic availability. In an advanced graduate level course, EE 381K-9 Advanced Digital Signal Processing, in the Department of Electrical Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin, students are assembling technology-based projects that will be used by other students in the class and in subsequent years. Thus, these projects serve a dual educational purpose: to teach those students who are creating them and to serve as resources to teach future students. This paper describes some of the challenges of developing student generated educational projects and course demos. Outcomes and observations are presented based on a trial run in the fall 2002 class. Specific topics such as the parameters of the assignment, necessary incentives, and mechanisms for collecting feedback are discussed. Numerous suggestions for incorporating these ideas into other classes are provided.