CES EduPack Short Courses at the
3rd International Materials Education Symposium

The 2011 Materials Education Symposium was preceded by two days of optional short courses. The courses were led by Professor Mike Ashby, with course presenters will including Dr Hugh Shercliff—both of the University of Cambridge. The courses introduce and demonstrate the use of CES EduPack. The theme is "Materials and the Environment".


Archived Information: Course agenda

Venue: The Long Room, Murray Edwards College

Note: attendees will need to bring their own laptop computers for the hands-on sessions, and will be provided with the new CES EduPack 2011 software.

April 5—Introducing Materials and the Environment (Archive)

The course will consist of a series of units, each including a short lecture, a software demonstration, discussion time, and a "hands-on session" during which attendees can use the CES EduPack software. Members of the CES EduPack team will be present to help and to answer questions.

09:00

Registration & refreshments

10:00

Course opens—Welcome

10:05

Introductions and Agenda Review

10:30

The Materials of Engineering

11:10

Hands-on exercises

11:20

Material Property Charts: mapping the materials universe

11:45

Hands-on exercises

12:00

Lunch

13:00

Manipulation Properties: chemistry, microstructure, architecture

13:30

Hands-on exercises

13:45

Eco-selection and the Eco-audit tool: introducing students to life-cycle thinking

14:30

Coffee & refreshments

14:45

Hands-on exercises

15:00

Materials Selection: translation, screening, documentation

15:40

Hands-on exercises

15:55

Selecting Processes: shaping joining and surface treatment

16:15

Hands-on exercises

16:30

Wrap up & discussion

17:00

Close

18:00 Drinks reception (until 19:00)

April 6—Advanced Materials Selection and Eco Design (Archive)

The course will consist of a series of units, each including a short lecture, a software demonstration, discussion time, and a "hands-on session" during which attendees can use the CES EduPack software. Members of the CES EduPack team will be present to help and to answer questions.

08:15

Registration & refreshments

09:00

Course opens—Welcome

09:05

Introductions and Agenda Review

09:15

Summary of day one

09:45

Questions

10:00

Ranking: material indices

10:30

Hands-on exercises

10:45

Coffee & refreshments

11:15

Objectives in Conflict: trade-off methods and penalty functions

11:45

Hands-on exercises

12:00

Sustainability and Material Efficiency: adapting to resource constraints

12:30

Hands-on exercises

12:45

Lunch

13:45

Introduction to the Granta Teaching Resource Website

14:00

Advanced CES EduPack Databases: standard, aerospace & polymer

14:30

Self-explore

14:45

The Hybrid Synthesizer: a tool for design and dissemination

15:00

Coffee & refreshments

15:30

Hands-on exercises

15:45

Wrap up & discussion

16:15

Close of main session

16:30

Optional session—CES Selector and Constructor in Research

17:15

Close of optional session

Evening Free evening (Speakers' dinner for Symposium presenters)

The Materials Education Symposium starts at 9am on Thursday »


Background to the courses

Who are the courses for?

Professors, Lecturers, and Program Directors of university and college courses related to materials and manufacturing.  The courses are relevant to the following disciplines: mechanical engineering; production engineering; aerospace engineering; materials science and engineering; industrial and product design; polymer science and engineering; eco-engineering; chemical engineering; bio-engineering; and architecture and the built environment.

Professor Mike Ashby lecturing

What are the courses about?

The CES EduPack package has been created by Professor Mike Ashby of Cambridge University and his colleagues over the past 20 years. Both the resources that it provides and the ideas that it implements are valuable to educators across a broad range of engineering-related courses, and from first to final-year teaching. They have been used to support and reinforce existing courses that use a variety of teaching approaches and texts, as well as in the design of new courses.

At the heart of CES EduPack is a database of materials and process properties, supported by textbook-style explanations of materials attributes and behavior. This provides a rich, interactive information resource that can engage students with the world of materials. The CES EduPack software applies the information in the database, enabling exercises and projects to analyze and compare materials properties, and to select materials for engineering applications. These computer-based learning tools are augmented with Powerpoint lectures, teaching resource books, student projects and exercises, and textbooks.

The course will show, through lectures interspersed with hands-on tutorial sessions using the software, how such resources can assist materials teaching.


Course lecturers

Professor Mike Ashby in discussion with a course attendeeCourse leader: Professor Mike Ashby

Mike Ashby (right) is Royal Society Research Professor in the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge. He is a world-renowned authority on engineering materials being the author/co-author of best-selling textbooks and of over 200 papers on topics including the mechanisms of plasticity and fracture, powder compaction, mechanisms of wear, methodologies for materials selection, and the modeling of material shaping processes. He is recipient of numerous awards and honours including Fellow of the Royal Society and Member of the American Academy of Engineering.

Dr Hugh Shercliff

Hugh Shercliff is Director of Undergraduate Education in the Department of Engineering at the University of Cambridge, and Director of Studies in Engineering at Girton College, Cambridge. He researches in areas including thermomechanical process modelling and knowledge management, design and manufacturing, sustainability and process selection, and resources for materials and design teaching. He is co-author, with Mike Ashby and David Cebon, of the textbook "Materials: Engineering, Science, Processing and Design".

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