Engineering Foundations Program

The curriculum is designed to require teamwork, creativity, and connection to society. Embedded advising aims at developing the whole student: course selection is important, and so is guiding students to other impactful opportunities in the UVA community as we assist with the transition from "how to high school" to "how to college." Career path development integration into both semesters helps students develop a plan for the next four years.

Courses

Engineering Foundations 1 (ENGR 1010)

Mini-projects engage students in technical skills and foundational mindsets of engineering including sociotechnical thinking, character awareness, and teamwork.

Engineering Foundations 2 (ENGR 1020)

Students engage in semester-long projects, working directly with a client, to define and analyze a problem relevant to that client, develop and test prototype solutions, and ultimately engineer a final design solution that is presented during the First Year Engineering Expo to the client and peers.

Program Goals and Objectives

Design Process: Engage in the engineering design process, which includes working with clients, defining problems, modeling systems, generating solutions, testing and evaluating solutions, and iterating.

Safety and Tools: Safely use foundational software and fabrication tools and skills in engineering design.

Sociotechnical Thinking in Engineering: Assess human, societal, global, and technical factors and ethical principles while balancing tradeoffs, constraints, and requirements in the design process.

Sustainability: Identify how engineering projects impact economic, societal, and environmental sustainability and take initial steps to drive sustainability transitions by design.

Collaboration and Teamwork: Effectively collaborate with teammates via navigating conflict and valuing their teammates through listening, asking questions, and sharing space, power, ideas, contributions, and responsibilities equitably.

Communication: Effectively communicate about foundational technical and sociotechnical content with team members, other engineers, clients, and diverse audiences via written, oral, and visual mediums.

Character Expression and Professional Development: Develop engineering career paths that will guide your experience at UVA and begin to establish a professional identity and character awareness through design thinking and self-reflection.

Projects

In ENGR 1010, students begin with a project focused on the novel October Sky, using it to introduce students to character awareness and to show character in action within an engineering context. 

From there, the Expand Project builds on that foundation by developing technical and teamwork skills. 

The course culminates in the SMOOSH Project, which grounds the engineering design process in a real connection to the UVA community while further strengthening both technical and teamwork skills.

In ENGR 1020, students spend the entire semester focused on the Setting Stone Project, working with a real client to put what they've learned about the engineering design process into practice.