Goals
In addition to the core values, there are attributes of EPICS programs that provide a richer learning experience and add value to community partnerships. While it’s understood that not all EPICS programs will initially achieve these goals, EPICS programs should recognize the value of the goals and continue to work to integrate them into their programs as appropriate for their own institution.
Students can participate in EPICS for more than a single academic period (e.g., semester). Long-term participation on a design team provides students the opportunity to perform many roles and learn a variety of technical and project skills, including teamwork, leadership, system design and project management. The long-term participation provides students with the opportunity to experience the entire life cycle of projects and creates an ongoing context for academic and professional growth. The credit structure within EPICS should encourage participation in a team for a year or longer if possible.
A large team size (8-20) is strongly recommended. When combined with the long-term participation of students, it provides significant continuity in team membership from one academic period to the next and can help maintain partnerships over several years. As the seniors graduate, they are replaced with new students and the team continues on.
This structure thus provides:
- Familiar contacts on the team each semester for the project partner
- Continuity and expertise necessary to complete and deliver large-scale projects of significant benefit to the community
- Ability of the team to manage multiple projects (e.g., short-term and long-term projects) for community partners
The kinds of needs that are addressed by EPICS projects usually require expertise from multiple disciplines to ensure the best possible outcomes for both the project partner and the students. When EPICS teams are comprised of students from across campus, the large team size and team continuity described above enable these multidisciplinary teams to meld and thus operate effectively. The EPICS program should provide scaffolding to enable the teams to be intentional about establishing a proper environment to allow the multidisciplinary teaming to succeed. Each student contributes knowledge and expertise from his or her discipline while learning the importance of the knowledge and expertise of other disciplines.
Each EPICS team should be mentored by a qualified advisor. Advisors can be faculty, professional staff from the campus or professionals from local industry. Ideally, the advisor has expertise in the technical areas that most closely matches a team’s project(s). With the large and diverse teams within EPICS, one person may not have all the technical expertise a team requires but other consultants on campus or within the broader community can fill these gaps. This model closely aligns with industry where the direct manager does not have all the expertise required by the individual designers. To support multidisciplinary teams, advisors may come from a wide variety of disciplines within and outside of engineering. In some cases, advisors can be paired as co-advisors to provide a broader perspective for the teams. The EPICS program should provide development opportunities for the advisors and support for them to manage their teams effectively.