Mechanical Engineering Vision Statement
The vision of the Mechanical Engineering department at Northern Arizona University is to be recognized as an outstanding Mechanical Engineering program in undergraduate and graduate-level education, and in faculty scholarship in focused areas of expertise.
Mission
The mission of the mechanical engineering department is to serve our students by offering an outstanding, professionally oriented undergraduate and graduate engineering education in a personalized environment.
We will achieve our mission through offering a rich learning environment, including:
- innovative and challenging curricula;
- excellent instruction;
- professional practice opportunities;
- research opportunities for undergraduates and graduate students;
- active student societies; and
- meaningful faculty advising and mentoring.
Our faculty, who serve as models of engineering professionals, will be intellectually active in applied research and professional activities that serve the technical needs of society and also benefit the education of our students. Our graduates will be prepared for engineering practice, advanced education, and leadership in the technical community and society at large.
Goals & Strategies
The following are goals of the Mechanical Engineering Department. Click on a goal to see the strategies.
Goal 1: Graduate high-quality B.S. engineers who are prepared for modern engineering practice.
Our graduates will grasp the fundamentals and their application, have practiced the application of engineering through diverse design experiences, and understand the context within which engineering is practiced.
Strategies:
- 1.1 Achieve high academic expectations of students in the classroom and program.
- 1.2 Encourage student applications of math, science and engineering science fundamentals through curricular design projects, research opportunities, internships, and student society projects. Emphasize effective and meaningful design experiences across the four years of the BS.
- 1.3 Reinforce fundamental engineering and science principles and mathematical analysis skills throughout the curriculum.
- 1.4 Provide state-of-the-art experimental facilities and a strong education in experimental design, methods and data analysis.
- 1.5 Emphasize skills for modern engineering practice including strong communication skills, teamwork, ethics, and the social/corporate context within which engineering decisions are made.
- 1.6 Emphasize student self-learning by incorporating a greater number of assignments, projects, and experiments in which students must access and learn new engineering content autonomously.
- 1.7 Integrate the use of computer design and analysis tools across ME curriculum.
- 1.8 Encourage cross-disciplinary course-work.
- 1.9 Develop challenging, in-depth upper-division mechanical engineering electives.
- 1.10 Support industry involvement in the curriculum through capstone design projects, seminars, student research projects and co-instruction.
Goal 2: Offer a practice-oriented masters-level graduate education.
The graduate program will serve the educational needs of place-bound professionals and residential students who intend to practice engineering.
Strategies:
- 2.1 Aggressively pursue the ABOR approval of a master's of engineering program for the CET.
- 2.2 Develop a M.Eng. graduate curricula in collaboration with industry to assure a relevant curriculum with a wide student market.
- 2.3 Develop graduate courses that will be offered in a flexible format and by alternative delivery methods.
- 2.4 Assure the graduate curricula strengthen the undergraduate program and utilize the faculty's expertise.
- 2.5 Become comfortable with Web-programming to support distance education.
Goal 3: Steadily increase the applied engineering research and/or pedagogical research conducted by ME faculty.
These activities will benefit our faculty members' professional development, enhance the quality of our academic programs, enable collaboration between faculty and students, and enhance our national reputation through dissemination.
Strategies:
- 3.1 Develop applied research programs in two areas to leverage efforts.
- 3.2 Develop composite materials research plus fabrication & test facility to serve industry.
- 3.3 Develop alternative energy systems research and demonstration facility and link to Southwest needs.
- 3.4 Steadily increase external funding at a modest rate to increase student support, faculty support, and facilities without over-committing to research efforts.
Goal 4: Provide high-quality education experience and career guidance to our students.
Strategies:
- 4.1 Achieve high standards for instructional quality.
- 4.2 Continuously improve our advising effectiveness.
- 4.3 Provide small classes (<20) wherever possible to enable close faculty and student interactions.
- 4.3 Implement mechanisms for continuous assessment of performance.
- 4.4 Provide effective mechanism for student informal feed-back.
- 4.5 Facilitate student access to internships and job placement.
- 4.6 Support student societies and projects through faculty advising and departmental.
Goal 5: Educate and graduate outstanding engineers reflecting the diversity of the American Southwest Population.
Strategies:
- 5.1 Increase the quality and quantity of students in ME by recruiting top high school students to the undergraduate program.
- 5.2 Increase the number of scholarships available for ME majors.
- 5.3 Develop recruiting materials that reflect the friendly atmosphere and desired diversity of our students.
- 5.4 Work closely with the College to assure we are serving our underrepresented students effectively.
Goal 6: Improve our relationships with our constituents to stay cognizant of external expectations and opportunities for the program.
Strategies:
- 6.1 Achieve an effective departmental advisory council, and steadily increase their participation in departmental activities.
- 6.2 Continue to support the capstone design project as a vehicle for continued communications and support with industry.
- 6.3 Establish low-overhead communications with alumni and parents via annual newsletter.
- 6.4 Implement an informative and attractive Web-site.
