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This paper discusses the impact of the REU Program at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona (Cal Poly Pomona) on the success of Participants in industry or graduate school. The REU Program titled "Research Experience for Undergraduates in UAV Technologies" has been funded by the NSF's EEC Program. The main goal of the Program is to increase undergraduate students' participation and interest in research on unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) technologies. Undergraduate students from 2- and 4-year institutions have been involved in a multidisciplinary research projects at Cal Poly Pomona. The REU Site has so far hosted a total of 43 diverse group of students for 8-10 weeks of summer research since 2017, with the projects focusing on research on the Dynamics and Control of UAVs, Collision Detection and Avoidance System for UAVs, Artificial Intelligence, Computer Vision, Navigation in GPS-Denied Environments, application of UAVs for search and rescue missions, object detection and tracking, and Flight Test experience. Another goal of the Program is to attract students from community colleges to STEM programs at 4-year institutions and encourage the participants to pursue their studies for graduate degrees. The Program has been tracking the past Participants. Most of the participants are now pursuing their educational or professional career in the area of UAVs and other related areas. The program has also been successful in motivating the Participants to graduate degrees in STEM disciplines. Some of the participants are already pursuing their studies for Master's or PhD degrees or are planning to do so. Information about the Participants' current employment or graduate school enrollment and relevance of current work to aerospace and/or UAV technology was gathered using a follow-up survey that also included open-ended qualitative feedback from the Participants about the long-term impact of the Program on their career. The paper presents the results obtained from the data collected from the Participants of the first three cohorts of the Program who were hosted during summers of 2017 to 2019. The paper focuses on the impact of the Program on the Participants' career choice, career advancement, and motivation for graduate degrees. The paper also presents written feedback/comments from the Participants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is the culmination of four years of an NSF-funded project implementing and assessing an undergraduate additive manufacturing course at three large state universities: Texas Tech University, Kansas State University, and California State University - Northridge. The research questions addressed are: (1) What are the changes in skill and knowledge concerning additive manufacturing experienced by undergraduate students? (2) What is the effect of this course on attitudes towards engineering and self-efficacy in engineering for enrolled undergraduate students? The sample consists of four years of data from the undergraduate students enrolled in the course at all three universities (combined N = 196). Our method for data collection was matched-pair surveys that contained both (i) an assessment for content knowledge and (ii) an attitudinal assessment previously validated in published research for data collection about attitudes towards engineering. Matched-pair surveys means that we collected data from Student X at Time 1 (before being taught) and then again from at Time 2 (after being taught) and are able to directly compare any change in content knowledge or attitude within the same person. We also collected demographic information to be able to see whether changes in, for example, women differed from those in men. All undergraduates experienced statistically significant increases in content knowledge and additive manufacturing skills. In an intriguing finding, female students outperformed male students, which fits with the research that indicates that engineering courses which emphasize pragmatic and real-world applications, as well as those that use group work, will disproportionately help underserved engineering populations like women and people of color succeed. Fitting with the above finding, undergraduates noted that they perceived that they had increased in teamwork, communication, and computer programming skills. These gains were particularly high in female students and students of color. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Involving undergraduate students in engineering research provides an opportunity and an avenue to gain in-depth and hands-on experiential learning with topics related to their major. Students involved learn about contributions to the field they study through research and understand the value of meaningful contributions, specifically experimentation and hardware development. Working with a research advisor provides students with mentoring, teamwork, and interaction with peers and graduate students. Research experience for undergraduate students provides a unique opportunity for faculty members and research advisors to guide them and help them explore career opportunities. This paper describes the design and development of a Data Acquisition System for a Hybrid and Liquid Rocket Test Stand. Data Acquisition is an important part to the development and design of an effective and functional rocket engine. Parameters such as thrust, pressure, temperature, and mass flow rate are important to see how the engine performs during rocket engine combustion. Along with the piping and containment systems designed to keep that combustion within reasonable boundaries. Some of the factors that increase the difficulty of data acquisition include high temperatures, high pressures, number of sensors, complex machinery, and the need for high sampling rates due to the rate at which the stability of combustion phenomena changes. Implementing a robust data acquisition system would greatly increase the ability to perform rigorous ground tests of hybrid and liquid motors. It would help to obtain real time analysis and feedback on the performance of the engine tested and would additionally help to identify and mitigate potential problems and risks that may occur. To this end, a High-Speed Data Acquisition system is being developed to serve the demands of such a system for the Rocket Propulsion Lab (RPL) at the university. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]