Magazine spring 2021

Featured

Refining Remote

Northwestern Engineering professors find their groove creating new learning tools and emphasizing mentorship.

Hands typing

Brian Sandalow

While the pandemic kept many academic communities apart this year, Northwestern Engineering thrived, finding new ways to educate students during an unprecedented situation.

After abruptly shifting away from in-person learning in March 2020, by Fall Quarter, professors got into their remote teaching rhythms. By Winter Quarter, they had further refined materials and lesson plans.

This shift meant transforming gaming from a pastime into a valuable learning tool, developing new gadgets to connect, tweaking in-person courses to fit the reality of remote, and doubling down on mentorship. Some new moves may find a permanent place in the McCormick School of Engineering’s pedagogy once students return to the classrooms and labs.

Michael Peshkin uses his Lightboard, a glass chalkboard that allows teachers to face students while writing and lecturing.

Michael Peshkin, professor of mechanical engineering and Breed Senior Professor of Design, built on his extensive experience creating devices for the classroom to develop aids that support remote learning.

In fall 2020, Peshkin developed a simple mirror hack that redirects a laptop webcam to become a document camera. All Northwestern students could request one be sent to them free. The hack allows students to show their written work to their professor or TA in real time, get feedback, and work on it together.

Long before the pandemic, Michael Peshkin developed a “lab in a backpack,” that became even more valuable as classes moved to remote.

Peshkin created a simple document webcam using a small mirror and a bit of wire.

Using this hack, students can virtually show their work and discuss issues with their teacher in real time.

Peshkin’s earlier inventions also found new life. Lightboard, which he developed in 2013, helps faculty produce “asynchronous” or pre-recorded content easily. Using the glass chalkboard, teachers can face toward their viewers as they write and draw, with their marks glowing in front of them.

Then there’s nScope, a portable electronics lab that fits in a backpack. The small, USB-powered device turns any laptop into an electronic workbench, allowing students to carry their lab equipment with them anywhere. nScope turned out to be pandemic-ready as a lab course.

Peshkin also hosted mini-webinars on how to get the most out of teaching virtually. “I wanted to teach our community the best practices,” Peshkin says. “Here are the tools, here’s why you might want to use them, and here’s how to do Zoom in a secure way.”

William White, professor of industrial engineering and management sciences, developed four video game-like stories for his IEMS Organizational Behavior course.

“These new, interactive case studies give students an immersive opportunity to think about how they would behave if they were in charge,” White says.

The web-based experiences, complete with dossiers, use sounds and visuals familiar to video gamers. One challenge places the players at the head of a company. A good decision adds points to their score; a bad one knocks them back—and is announced by a clip of Michael Scott from The Office, whose management skills aren’t exactly best practices.

Creating the experiences also opened up learning opportunities. Enlisting the help of IEMS student Ben Nelson Bentley (’21), White recruited four student developers who had lost internships because of the pandemic and paid them through grant funds.

“It can be difficult to stay focused on a laptop screen for hours on end during Zoom calls,” Bentley says. “Using interactive elements to break up the lecture kept students engaged and helped to develop a better understanding of the cases on which they’re based.”

Try one of Professor White's Video Game-like Immersive Interactive Stories

It’s your first day in charge of Yellowtail Marine, a San Diego-based boat manufacturer. You’re scheduled to fly to Miami to meet with a potential customer, but there’s an issue in production that needs urgent attention. Two investigators from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration are at headquarters, waiting to inspect your facility. Meanwhile, your new staff wants to hear from you.

What is your first priority? How do you handle each situation? What do you delegate? It’s up to you to decide, but it’s clear each path has its own potential pitfalls that could lead to negative feedback from employees and poor results for your company.

Try an immersive interactive story

Suzanne Olds During the pandemic, students have benefited from experiences outside the classroom as well as inside. Students took advantage of the biomedical engineering mentorship program last fall to help them to connect to alumni.

Suzanne Olds, undergraduate program chair and professor of instruction of biomedical engineering, worked with the department advisory board to launch a biomedical engineering four-year mentorship program. Though the program had been in development for more than a year, the launch during the pandemic could not have come at a more helpful time.

As of fall 2020, 166 BME undergraduates were paired with a unique alumni mentor whom they meet with each quarter. The students use those connections primarily to get career and internship advice during an unusual job search period.

“My mentor is an absolute perfect match,” says BME student Izabela Stankiewicz (’21). “I have struggled figuring out post-grad life and am overjoyed that I finally have somebody to talk to who is working in a position I am extremely interested in and who also has a similar background to me.”

Improvisational performance is partner-based, supporting teammates’ ideas and feeding off their energy.

Despite the challenge of going remote, adjunct lecturer Byron Stewart and Assistant Dean Joe Holtgreive said, “yes, and,” by bringing Engineering Improv I (The Art of Allowing) and II (The Art of Inspiration, which became The Art of Application) to Zoom.

Byron Stewart As always, these courses offered through the Office of Personal Development challenge students to tackle unexpected obstacles, building leadership and resilience skills that can be leveraged in both academic and non-academic contexts.

Joe Holtgreive “Having to go remote required creativity in how we teach the mindset and practices of Engineering Improv I,” Stewart says.

“And completely rethink the goals of Engineering Improv II,” Holtgreive adds. “Zoom may not be the best platform for teaching improv, but it turns out improv is the best way to engage our students on Zoom.”

The students reported feeling more confident and comfortable in their other remote classes when applying the lessons of Engineering Improv.

Mastering Materials for a Renewable World

Mark Hersam’s nanoelectronic materials research is advancing innovation in energy efficiency and artificial intelligence.

Big Idea: A Softer Robot, Inspired by Muscles

To create a safer, more practical robot, Professor Ryan Truby and his team developed a soft, flexible actuator that enables robots to move by expanding and contracting—just like a human muscle.

Designing Solutions with the Patient in Mind

Boston University Professor Catherine Klapperich uses biomaterials and diagnostics to improve healthcare for women.

Passion & Perseverance

As one of the pharma industry's most reputed global supply chain leaders, Kimberly Lounds Foster thrives on opportunities to help patients worldwide.

Completing the Circuit

Aamir Paul steers efforts to combat climate change and boost sustainability.

Soil Secrets

Professor Ludmilla Aristilde collaborates worldwide to gain a better understanding of the soil that sustains life on earth.

Envisioning Engineering’s Future

Dean Christopher Schuh and faculty leaders have spent the last year mapping out Northwestern Engineering’s future in research and education. The school’s new strategic vision offers a glimpse of what is to come.

Going Quantum

Northwestern Engineering researchers are collaborating to harness the extraordinary phenomena that underlie the origin and structure of the universe.

Greetings from Northwestern Engineering

A message from Dean Christopher Schuh