UCL’s Integrated Engineering Programme Uses MATLAB to Teach Mathematical Modeling and Analysis
Using MATLAB Significantly Improves Student-Faculty Engagement
“Incorporating MATLAB Onramp and MATLAB Grader has freed up significant classroom time that we now use to answer student questions, scaffold collaborative work, discuss practical engineering problems, and raise the overall quality of student-faculty engagement.”
Key Outcomes
- MATLAB Onramp allowed UCL students to learn coding before exploring how to solve engineering problems
- MATLAB Grader enabled faculty to monitor online assignments and understand student progress as well as quickly identify areas of collective or individual struggle
- MATLAB Onramp allowed instructors to use classroom time to focus on solving real-world engineering problems
Instructors at UCL are using MATLAB to improve student-faculty engagement while also teaching real-world engineering skills.
The Centre for Engineering Education (CEE) at University College London (UCL) trains future engineers through the Integrated Engineering Programme (IEP). This program emphasizes project- and practice-based activities for human-centered design, employability skills, and mathematical modeling.
Roughly 1,000 students across eight UCL engineering departments undertake the Mathematical Modelling and Analysis I (MMA1) module every year. During this 10-week foundational course, students complete MATLAB Onramp in their first week to learn the basics of MATLAB®. As the course progresses, they complete autograded computational modeling activities via MATLAB Grader™, as well as participate in collaborative and hands-on mathematical modeling workshops.
This setup has enabled instructors to flip the traditional format in which teaching computational modeling uses valuable classroom time. Instead, students engage with preparatory material using MATLAB Onramp and MATLAB Grader before coming to workshops. Classroom time, as a result, now focuses on more challenging, real-world modeling and analysis projects such as simulating drug uptake and pharmacokinetics in the human body, modeling robotic arms, designing microphones, and analyzing historical data on sea and air CO2 concentrations to study ocean acidification.
Internal surveys indicate that, in addition to finding MATLAB Onramp engaging and easy to use, students appreciate the problem-based approach. The approach enabled learners to explore real-world engineering challenges using mathematical models in MATLAB, earning MMA1 international acclaim as a “Best Practice Activity” in the 2022 Collaborative Engineering Education in the Digital Age case study report.
