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Although separated by more than four U.S. states, dozens of high school students and teachers teamed virtually over the summer on design projects using Dassault Systèmes’ (DS) Version 6 and 3DSwYm community network solutions, thanks to an innovative collaboration between the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech) and the University of Detroit Mercy (UDM).
“The students didn’t even want to take breaks,” says Pamela Todd, director of UDM’s Pre-college Programs for the College of Engineering and Science. “We couldn’t pry them away from their computers even at lunch.”The summer program helps lay the groundwork for Georgia Tech’s Mentors Project DARPA grant, which aims to create the next-generation digital manufacturing workforce by exposing students in 1,000 high schools worldwide to careers in engineering over the next four years. The Innovation Camps brought high school students and their teachers to the Georgia Tech and UDM campuses, where they formed virtual teams using collaborative online technology to co-create and prototype renewable energy and automotive design projects.
Collaborative, crowd-sourced design
To go from design to physical object in a very short time in a collaborative, crowd-source manner is at the heart of DARPA’s goals for the program, says Tony Docal, curriculum and training manager of Georgia Tech’s summer camp program. Using DS Version 6 Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) solutions and rapid prototyping technologies, students co-created, designed, built and operated team projects with the same software used by leading manufacturers worldwide.
Starting with Lego Mindstorms Wind Turbine and Ground Robot kits as their baselines, the student teams designed and built non-standard parts to enhance the efficiency and performance of both kits. Because each team had members on both campuses, collaboration occurred online with Version 6 PLM, which includes CATIA, DELMIA, ENOVIA and SIMULIA, and with the 3DSwYm platform for creating instant online communities.
“Although some students were on a campus near the Canadian border while others were deep in the southern United States, Version 6 and 3DSwYm allowed them to talk about their projects and share information online in real-time design review sessions,” said Dr. Dan Schrage, professor and director of the Integrated Product Lifecycle Engineering Laboratory at Georgia Tech, which conducted the summer camp. “Having young people experience the excitement of working with people in other locations prepares them to become innovative global engineers of the future,” adds Dr. Leo Hanifin, UDM dean of the College of Engineering and Science.
Creating the next generation of engineers
As the program grows Georgia Tech, along with UDM and other universities, plans to introduce prize challenge competitions for students at clusters of high schools across the USA to jointly design and build moderately complex systems, much as corporate manufacturers work with their supply partners.
DS supplies the software licenses to teach participants and provides camp participants with one-year student licenses to encourage their continued interest. The Ford Fund supported the program with funding to UDM, and Ford Motors provided an exclusive plant tour and a presentation by Robert Trecapelli, Ford’s director of Digital Innovation and Global PLM.
