A series of engineering education lectures will take place at UNLV in November.

An Oct. 30 lecture will feature Teri Reed Rhoads, a professor in the School of Industrial Engineering at the University of Oklahoma, who will speak about "Assessment in Engineering Education." Rhoads has spent the last five years studying effective means of learning in the engineering statistics classroom. She is interested not only in the mental processes associated with learning, but also with the emotional processes, and how each should be assessed. She is the past strategy director of assessment and evaluation for the National Science Foundation- sponsored Foundation Coalition, a consortium of seven universities around the United States that work together to enhance engineering education.

On Nov. 6, Robert C. Knox will present "A Practitioner Directed Approach to Teaching Engineering Design." Knox is a Samuel Roberts Noble Presidential professor and interim director of the School of Civil Engineering and Environmental Science at the University of Oklahoma. At the school, both practitioners and the faculty teach students in the senior level capstone courses. Students work in teams on "real-world" problems and their work products are evaluated by practicing professional engineers. Knox says students get valuable exposure and experience, while the school gets important feedback regarding curriculum content.

On Nov. 13, Bruce Kramer, acting director of the division of engineering education and centers for the National Science Foundation, will deliver a lecture on "Where is Engineering Education Headed?" Kramer will talk about the popularity of engineering education in the United States as evidenced by the fact that engineering classrooms are full and engineering graduates are in demand.

The Nov. 20 lecture will focus on an innovative new engineering curriculum that enables students to take a simulated piece of undeveloped land and actually design a partial city. Randall Kolar, a professor of civil engineering and environmental science at the University of Oklahoma, will present the lecture "The Sooner City Project." Sooner City refers to a comprehensive design project that is being integrated throughout the university's undergraduate civil engineering curriculum. Entering freshman are assigned a simulated plat of undeveloped land -- not unlike the expanses of prairie that greeted the "Sooner" settlers of 1889. By the time the students graduate, they will have completed a partial design for a city. Design tasks include engineering for water supply, stormwater management, transportation systems, and steel and concrete structures, all of which are learned in different course curriculums. Kolar says that the four-year design project unifies the curriculum and allows students to utilize new advancements in technology that make the students more desirable to perspective employers.

All of UNLV's Howard R. Hughes College of Engineering lectures are free and open to the public. Each lecture is set for 3-4 p.m. in the Thomas T. Beam Engineering Complex, Room B-178.

For more information, call the Howard R. Hughes College of Engineering at 895-3699.