Using Private Industry Based Projects to Teach an Air Conditioning Technical Elective Course

This paper presents the use of private industry based projects to augment the teaching of a senior level thermal design Heating Ventilation Air Conditioning and Refrigeration (HVAC/R) technical elective. The projects describe herein are used to augment the laboratory portion of the course, and act a synthesizing agents allowing students to experience real-world problem solving first hand. The industry based projects are solicited form local industry representatives, whereby mentors from the engineering company are assigned to direct a team of students to complete a given set of action items during the duration of a semester concluding in an end of semester customer design review. The key to this type of learn-by-doing is the active engagement and willingness on behalf of the industry mentors to take time to guide the students via biweekly face to face or web based tag up meetings. This type of experience is invaluable for the students, since it demonstrates the importance of establishing a network of mentors in order to foster life-long learning in the students chosen field of study.