A Practicum on Energy and Sustainability Engineering.

We report our recent experience from a one-hour practicum course in which students were encouraged to take part in a sustainability competition organized by the student sustainability committee (SSC) at the University of Illinois. Goal of the four-hour practicum course required for the Master of Engineering in Energy Systems degree (ENG 572/573) at the University of Illinois [1] is to provide all students with a project or practicum (internship) opportunity to gain practical experience as well as develop written and oral communication skills. This year all new students in the program were required to sign up for one hour of ENG 573. (The remaining three hours are to be fulfilled in later semesters.) To provide the skills for group work and help develop written and communication skills, students formed groups and participated in the student sustainability competition organized yearly by the SSC. These groups, studied and analyzed options available to them, developed sustainability projects to be proposed, presented their ideas in front of their colleagues (in ENG 573) for critical feedback, consulted with personnel at university's facilities and services (F and S) and other departments, prepared the proposals, and then submitted them before the deadline. This paper is also a part of the exercise, written primarily by the students in class. It was a valuable experience. Based on lessons learned, this class will be offered again in this format in coming semesters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]