Introduction of Students to Engineering Design Practices of Remote and Distributed Collaboration - Fall 2020 Volume 8 Number 4

Oct 15, 2026

The onset of COVID-19 forced major changes in EE-Emerge, a course sequence in which electrical and computer engineering students design and build interactive electronic exhibits for the public. Instead of public interaction, the spring objectives shifted toward remote, distributed collaboration. Students practiced effective teamwork across time zones and communicated results using tools such as GitHub and Hackster, while adapting projects under campus closures, supply constraints, and safety-focused testing.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages6

Reading Time15 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Methods

Collaboration Tools and Communication

Sharing Digital Assets

Training, Troubleshooting, and Outcomes

| | Ad | vances in Engineering Edu | cation | | | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | FALL 2020 VOLUME 8 NUMBER 4 Introduction of Students to Engineering Design Practices of Remote and Distributed Collaboration: Lessons Learnt from COVID-19 SEAN ALLING AND ANDRÉ KNOESEN University of California Davis Davis, CA ABSTRACT The onset of COVID-19 required drastic changes on how students interacted in EE-Emerge, a course where the students design and build exhibits demonstrating engineering to the public. COVID-19 was used as an opportunity to expose students on how teams in industry collaborate effectively on a project remotely across time zones, and how to communicate their results on sites like GitHub and Hackster. Key words: Project based learning, Electrical engineering, Computer engineering INTRODUCTION EE-Emerge is a yearlong course sequence offered to electrical and computer engineering juniors and advanced sophomores where students design and build interactive electronic exhibits for K-12 students to promote engineering education to the general public. This course sequence, now in its eighth year, brings out the creativity of our engineering students, emphasizes teamwork, provides experience in project management and communication, while also building new practical technical skills. At the beginning of the school year, students propose project ideas and as the quarter progresses, these ideas are fine-tuned, and four teams are formed. Team designs and subcomponents are developed early to mid-winter and project integration occurs early spring. All EE-Emerge projects must be thoroughly tested to be robust, which is in contrast with some senior design projects that are often proof-of-concept demonstrations. During mid to late spring, students develop their FALL 2020 VOLUME 8 NUMBER 4 1 ADVANCES IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION Introduction of Students to Engineering Design Practices of Remote and Distributed Collaboration communication skills by presenting their projects at public events such as Picnic Day which is a campus event in early Spring, Makers Fair in San Mateo, and the College of Engineering Design Showcase. METHODS COVID-19 began to affect EE-Emerge operations in late February when supply lines in Asia were shutting down and student teams lost access to preferred printed circuit board supplier. This presented the opportunity to engage students on the importance of considering supply line stability and how this could influence their projects. Campus closures as a result of COVID-19 occurred in the last weeks of winter and directly affected the EE-Emerge student’s ability to present their designs to the public. We also shut down all EE-Emerge activities as not to add additional stress on the students. Instead of canceling the spring quarter offering, we decided to swivel EE-Emerge objectives for spring from interacting with the public, to instead use the opportunity of restricted social interaction as an opportunity to expose students how to collaborate effectively on a project remotely and how to communicate their results on sites like GitHub and Hackster. Once the decision was made, we informed the students of the plan and 86% of the 29 students decided to continue into the Spring, which is much higher than the 62% of students the previous year. At the beginning of spring, each team reviewed their designs and made adjustments so that projects could be completed with students not having access to other teams and or campus facilities. The largest challenges faced by students was how to test software on real hardware and how to assemble their projects. Luckily, each team had several members within close proximity of UC Davis’s campus, and these members performed the final software and hardware testing, project assembly, and final testing in a manner that met COVID related safety concerns. Instructors ordered parts and delivered them to team members lo

FAQs

What was the original purpose of EE-Emerge for students?

Students designed and built interactive electronic exhibits to promote engineering education to K-12 students and the general public.

How did COVID-19 change EE-Emerge objectives?

The course shifted from public-facing interaction to training students to collaborate effectively on remote projects and to communicate outcomes using platforms like GitHub and Hackster.

Which tools supported remote collaboration during the spring term?

Teams used Slack for communication, GitHub for storing and syncing digital assets, and Zoom for office hours, live training, and recorded instruction.

Oct 15, 2026

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