Engineering Fun Top teacher brings excitement, understanding to classroom By Maria M. Lameiras
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hen he was a student at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Tom Kurfess never imagined he'd teach about teaching. Today a professor of mechanical engineering at Georgia Tech, Kurfess is one of the faculty members responsible for redesigning a sophomore mechanical engineering class into a teaching tool that has universities like MIT and Carnegie Mellon clamoring for the formula. "I wasn't actually plan-
ning on getting into teaching," says Kurfess, who has his bachelor's degree, two master's degrees and a doctorate from MIT. "I just thought I'd get my BS in mechanical engineering and get a job in industry and make a lot of money. Then I thought I'd better get my master's because I thought it would help me advance in industry. One thing led to another and I got another master's in electrical engineering and, by then, I figured I almost had my PhD so why not go ahead." An adviser again de-
The Kurfess File Born: May 18, 1964, in Des Plaines, III. Education: BS in Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1986; MS in Mechanical Engineering, MIT, 1987; MS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, MIT, 1988; PhD in Mechanical Engineering in Controls and Manufacturing area, MIT, 1989. Personal: Wife, Adriana Kurfess, research engineer, teacher and stay-at-home mother; three children: Rebecca, 6, Alexander, 4, and Gregory, 3, Achievements: The American Society of Mechanical Engineers Blackall Machine Tool and Gage Award, 2001; Georgia Institute of Technology Class of 1940 W. Howard Ector Outstanding Teacher Award, 2000; Society of Manufacturing Engineers Philip R. Marsilius Outstanding Young Manufacturing Engineer Award, 1996; American Society of Mechanical Engineers Pi Tau Sigma Gold Medal Award, 1995; National Science Foundation Presidential Faculty Fellowship Award, 1993; National Science Foundation Young Investigator Award, 1992. Leisure Interests: Spending time with family, running, cooking.
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railed his plans to enter industry. "He said, 'You should try a job in academia and if you don't like it you can always get a job in industry.' And here I am 12 years later," Kurfess says. "I absolutely love it. I have a great time. When you teach students something and they pick up on it and you see the lightbulb go on, it's just fantastic." Before joining Tech's mechanical engineering faculty as an associate professor in 1994, Kurfess was an assistant and an associate professor at Carnegie Mellon University. His primary teaching responsibility is ME 2110, Creative Decisions and Design, a class that has energized sophomore engineering students and developed an almost cult-like following among those who have completed the course. "The students have to design and build devices for a competition. Each semester it is a different competition, and you have a new group of students, so it's like never teaching the same course twice," Kurfess says. "They have to do everything — strategy, mechanical system design, microcontroller system design and build it. It is one thing to draw something out on paper. It is another thing to build it." The course gives the students hands-on experience with machine shop tools
they may not have had an opportunity to use before and a feel for the production side of mechanical design. "Odds are, when they get a job, they won't be running this equipment, but they will be supervising the people who are running it to create the systems they are designing," says Kurfess, who apprenticed in a machine shop in his native Chicago before going to MIT. "It is one thing to think about an airplane and to say, T know how an airplane works,' but it is another thing to go build one." Students who have completed the course often come back to watch each subsequent semester's competition and to cheer on their favorite teams. Last semester, more than 50 parents and other family members came to campus to watch the competition as well. "They have a lot of fun," Kurfess says of the students. "They really get into it and I have to tell them they need to work on their other courses." The course has been completely redesigned over the past four years by Kurfess and his colleagues in mechanical engineering. "Every term we poll the students to see what they thought was hard and what they thought was easy and then we focus on the hard stuff, because you never