Prize Winners
Open Day - a
special day in the calendar of the School of Electrical, Electronic & Computer
Engineering when Final Year students will display their design projects to examiners,
parents, donors and the public.
Our graduates then enter a new world; not all of them will be starting their
careers working for large companies, but for small enterprises where through
their hard work and innovation they will design and provide products and
services to improve the quality of our lives and the prosperity of our country.
Electrical, Electronic and Computer Engineering are demanding professions in
which new theories, techniques and products must be designed and assessed.
Engineers must have the ability to continually update their knowledge to remain
effective through a process of life long learning.
Perhaps the most difficult skill to acquire is the ability to design. Design is
fundamental to engineering and our students are required to participate in
design studies during all four years of the curriculum. The design
specifications are always technically advanced for the students and this teaches
them good self-study habits and the way knowledge is acquired. It also gives
them confidence in their own abilities by confirming theory through
experimentation and building a product that meets the specifications imposed.
Students work in groups of five to ten students in the other design courses for
the degree and this teaches them how to cooperate and pool their knowledge. They
learn from one another and develop a strong bond often working late into the
night to meet their goals. Normally, the students are given the same design
specifications and this develops a wonderful spirit of competition to see whose
motor turns fastest or whose radio transmitter produces the strongest signal.
The design projects undertaken by our students are a test of their individual
abilities to survive as a design engineer. Working alone for the first time,
they are required to meet individual design specifications associated with each
project. The students are given specifications in June and in the first few
months, they researched the topic and began to form ideas on how to proceed. It
is only in mid October when they have written all their final examinations that
they are able to work full time on the project.
The process of internal examining the students takes place on the Wednesday
before Open Day and external examiners are invited to examine projects during
Open Day. Prize-winners will be determined and the appropriate cards
displayed adjacent to the presentations with the names of the donors of the
prizes. We are proud of our students and believe them equal to the best in the
world. They work long and hard to make Open Day possible.
