Applied Student Project Opportunities
| SAIT's Construction, MacPhail School of Energy, and Information and Communications Technologies departments are now accepting project ideas from potential industry sponsors/mentors to collaborate with its students on applied student projects in the following programs:
Construction Energy Information and Communications Technologies
Construction
Architectural Technologies (ARCH)
The Architectural Technologies program is designed to provide graduates with the essential skills required by architectural firms, residential builders and many other companies involved in the construction industry. Graduates are well equipped to work as junior CADD drafters for these companies. These skills are supported by a thorough understanding of how commercial, institutional or residential building systems are assembled and the performance requirements of all building components.
The program is two years, or four 16-week semesters in length. The first two semesters are common to all students in the program. In the third and fourth semester, students have the option to specialize in the Architectural stream or the Building Development option. The curriculum in the Architectural Technologies program is currently under review and will be offered as an e-Learning program starting in the fall of 2007.
- ARCH-384 Advanced Building Science
Project Overview:
Working in groups, students will monitor and assess the performance of a building envelope assembly exposed to the Calgary environment. Private industry clients/mentors, such as builders, commercial general contractors, architects or sales and manufacturing firms, will supply a full-size mock-up of the product and assembly being evaluated, along with technical data and resource personnel on a consulting basis. The mock-up will be installed in an outdoor location on campus, instrumented by the students, and subjected to the Calgary climatic conditions over a period of several months, including winter conditions. The evaluation of the performance of the assembly or product will be restricted to simple recording of temperature, moisture movement, visual degradation and similar observational data. The intent is not to conduct exhaustive tests and performance evaluations, but rather to provide the students with an opportunity to observe and record how a product or assembly behaves.
Examples Potential Projects:
Long-term exposure studies; Wall Assembly – performance of materials in certain climates
Duration: January to April
Project Criteria:
Project sponsors/mentors are asked to: - Provide ongoing technical support;
- Provide a mocked-up assembly(s); and,
- Cover the cost of monitoring equipment and instrumentation specific to their product.
SAIT will provide the physical location for the outdoor testing and copies to the student reports.
Student Group Size: 4-6 students
EnergyInstrumentation Engineering Technology (IET)
Instrumentation Engineering Technology provides students with sound theoretical and practical training in the operation and maintenance of automated process control and measurement systems used in the production of various commodities. Instrumentation technologists use test equipment to install, troubleshoot, calibrate, maintain and repair electrical/pneumatic measurement and control instruments. Students will learn about pneumatic devices, control valves, electronic instruments, digital logic devices, computer-based process controls, and control system design. Students also become well versed in personal computer applications in instrumentation, process control systems design, Fieldbus, SCADA, PLC, distributed control system design and interfacing of industrial microcomputer control systems with real processes.
Graduates find work in engineering design, instrumentation sales and industrial process plants in a variety of sectors, including power production, oil and gas refining, processing, transportation, fertilizer production, pulp and paper, wood processing, petrochemical processing, food processing, mining and manufacturing.
- PROJ-320 Industrial Project Management
Project Overview:
Industrial Project Management is designed to introduce Industrial Instrumentation Engineering Technology students to the fundamental concepts of project management and control system design, and apply these to an actual instrumentation project.
Students, in teams, will create a fictional engineering company and will produce status reports and specific deliverables for clients, and will undertake activities that will involve project terminology, project structure, project constraints, work breakdown structures, organisational charts, and creating schedules. Student will learn how to produce all of the documentation involved in designing a control system such as P&ID drawings, loop drawings, installation drawings, data sheets and an instrumentation index.
Students in this course develop the initial components of an instrumentation project as a lead into PROJ-325 Instrumentation Project.
Duration: September to December
- PROJ-325 Instrumentation Project
Project Overview:
This project course is a follow-up course to PROJ-320 Industrial Project Management and builds from the basic concepts of project management and control system design into the detailed design phase of an instrumentation engineering project. Learners continue on with their engineering company teams from the previous PROJ-320 course to complete their project and orally present their proposal to a client panel. Duration: January to April Example Past Project:
A control system for a three phase horizontal inlet separator
Project Criteria:
Project sponsors/mentors are asked to: - Work with the students beginning in September in their PROJ-320 course, and continue on as project client/mentor until the end of PROJ-325 in April of the following year;
- Provide project ideas that are not more than 200 hours in length;
- Provide specifications for the students pertaining to:
- Instrumentation
- Logic systems
- Control valves
- Communications
- Area classifications and materials
- Mounting; and,
- Play an active role in the evaluation of the student projects, and taking part in the end of term IET Student Project Showcase with course Instructors and Program Coordinators.
Student Group Size: 4-5 students
Information and Communications Technologies
Bachelor of Applied Information Systems Technology (BAT)
This degree program integrates theory and practice in management and advanced technical skills to help graduates succeed in the demanding field of information technology. To ensure the training is relevant to today's business needs, the curriculum has been designed in cooperation with leading business and industry partners. The program can be customized to meet students' specific career objectives. Students take core studies, to provide a common background in management principles, and then choose a technical major, which includes theory, lab and project courses and two practicum terms.
- APCS-503 Control Systems Project
Project Overview:
Team based control systems or automation project.
Using a digital feedback control system model, the students will take a client's need and then create a working control system. The system will be mathematically modeled and predicted performance verified by appropriate measuring techniques.
Project Criteria:
Client to provide project scope, supplies and liaison.
Student Group Size: 4-5 students
- APSD-502 ISD Project
Project Overview:
Design and IT architecture to meet a business need.
Project teams will be formed to work on IT design projects. The learners are expected to demonstrate their proficiency in their technical areas and project management and also their understanding of the system development methodology. The course starts with the system requirement phase and ends with the conceptual or technical design phase and a business case. The focus of this course is on understanding problem/opportunity, identifying alternatives, recommending and justifying the recommended solution.
Project Criteria:
Client to provide project scope, liaison and access to appropriate personnel.
Student Group Size: 4-6 students
- APSE-503 Software Engineering Design Project
Project Overview:
Team Based IT software development project.
Project teams will be formed to work on IT development projects. The learners are expected to demonstrate their proficiency in their technical areas and project management and also their understanding of the software development and testing methodology.
Project Criteria:
Client to provide project scope, liaison and access to appropriate personnel.
Student Group Size: 4-6 students
- APST-501 Requirement Engineering Project
Project Overview:
The project teams will focus on elicitation; gathering; analyzing; synthesizing; qualifying; quantifying; and formalizing the business and user requirements, this process will transform those potential requirements into system specifications that the system architect and developers can use to design and build business solution that solve real world problem. The project deliverables may include system requirement specification, user document and user interface design.
Why do requirement engineering process matter?
A Standish Group study (Chaos Report 2004) found that 53% of the projects were late and/or over budget, and 18% of the projects failed, and the top reason causing those challenges and failures stemmed from inadequate or non-existent business/user requirement analysis activities.
Project teams will be formed to work on product/system requirement projects. The learners are expected to demonstrate their proficiency in team building and some project management skills and also their understanding of the system development life cycle (SDLC) and requirement engineering process. The course project starts with the engagement and understanding of the business and the business sponsor needs, formulate the information/requirement gathering strategy plan, and ultimately writing the formal requirement specification. The focus of this course is on understanding real world business challenge/opportunity, execute appropriate information gathering and modeling techniques, and leverage the requirement engineering process to ensure those requirements do meet user/business needs.
Project Criteria:
Client to provide project scope, liaison and access to appropriate personnel.
Student Group Size: usually teams of 4.
- APST-530 Emerging Technology Project
Project Overview:
The student applied research project is intended to develop a collaborative process with the industry players to address a specific issue impacting on them. The focus will be on technology identification and assessment, as the first phase in a R&D process.
The orientation of the project can cover any one of the stages of "identification and assessment" of the product R&D life cycle:
- Scoping: Assist in establish the scope and domain of the technology search, based on the capabilities of the firm and the potential threat or opportunity from the technology.
- Searching: Assist in determination of the information and technology sources to monitor, the process to screen and search for signals of both emergent technology and its commercial viability.
- Evaluating: Assist in identifying and prioritizing candidate technologies, and evaluate against the firm's technical capabilities, the target market needs, and the firm's competitive opportunities.
- Committing: The above 3 steps are used to determine whether to pursuit a particular technology. The fourth step is about how to pursue it, by aligning this potential R&D investment with the corporate strategic intent.
These approaches will emphasize integration of knowledge and technology rather than discovering and changing fundamental science and concepts. The student applied research effort will help to fill some of the gap between university research results (changing fundamental science) to product/technology pre-commercialization.
Project teams will be formed to work on this applied research project. The learners are expected to demonstrate their proficiency in team building and project management skill and also their understanding of the product R&D development life cycle.
Project Criteria:
Client provides project scope, liaison and access to appropriate personnel, as well as technology transfer when appropriate.
Student Group Size: Usually teams of 4.
Computer Engineering Technology (CNT)
Students in the Computer Engineering Technology (CNT) program develop a sound fundamental understanding of electronics, computer hardware, computer programming, computer hardware interfacing, and computer networks.
- PROJ-379 System Design Project
Project Overview:
The students will apply the skills and knowledge learned throughout the CNT program to the design and fabrication of a project which involves elements of computer hardware electronics, software, operating systems, and networking. The project is carried out using project management skills and methodologies.
Duration: September to December and January to April
Examples of Past Projects - Cell phone controlled car starter
- Trailer hitch monitoring device that allows you to connect a trailer to a vehicle without having to use mirrors
- A Hotel In-Suite interface for controlling lights, temperature, mini-bar, playing music, and ordering room service
View more examples of past projects
Project Requirements: - Projects must fit neatly within the semester the students have the project lab
- Projects must be approved by the project instructors before students begin work
- Projects must contain several of the following elements: networking, operating systems, software, hardware. Some elements may have larger emphasis than others
- Student groups must have full freedom to manage the project and all related elements
- The project lab is not to be used simply as a "work term" for the students
- Any expenses incurred by the students during the course of the project and relating to the project must be paid by the project sponsor
Student Group Size: 3-4 students
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