ENSC1001

Global Challenges in
Engineering
Unit Coordinators
Professor Caroline Baillie & Professor
Anya Waite
Faculty of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

UNIT OUTLINE
Semester 1, 2014

Figure 1: Waste compaction, Tamala Park, Western Australia

Figure 2: Cartoneros collecting waste, Buenos Aires (Eric Feinblatt)

Figure 3: The village of Sandikhola, Nepal (EWB)

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

Table of Contents

ESSENTIAL ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION ........................................................................... 4

Important Notice ........................................................................................................................... 4
UNIT COORDINATORS .................................................................................................................. 5
TEACHING TEAM ........................................................................................................................... 5
INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................. 7
LEARNING OUTCOMES ................................................................................................................ 7
LEARNING ACTIVITIES .................................................................................................................. 8
STUDENT FEEDBACK ................................................................................................................... 9
TEXT BOOK & RESOURCES ....................................................................................................... 10
ASSESSMENT DETAILS .............................................................................................................. 10
Assessment Mechanism ............................................................................................................ 10
Academic Conduct ..................................................................................................................... 11
STUDENTS RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES ......................................................................... 12
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ....................................................................................................... 12

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

ESSENTIAL ADMINISTRATIVE INFORMATION

Unit Title

Global Challenges in Engineering

Unit Code

ENSC1001

Unit Coordinators

Professor Caroline Baillie & Professor Anya Waite

School

Faculty of Engineering, Computing and Mathematics

Credit Value

6 points

Additional requirements

Nil

Handbook Website

http://units.handbooks.uwa.edu.au/units/ensc/ensc1001

Unit Website

https://www.lms.uwa.edu.au/login.php

Faculty or School Website

http://www.ecm.uwa.edu.au

Contact Hours

There will be only one Orientation Lecture in week 1. Each

week students will attend one two-hour Information Session
and one two-hour Practical Workshop; in addition students will
be expected to meet in their project teams to work on the
projects. Attendance is compulsory for all Information
Sessions and Practical Workshops.

Important Notice
The Unit Outline (this document) gives the student important information about the unit, its aims,
outcomes, materials, programme and assessment.
Note that important information relating to policies, examinations, expectations, copyright,
referencing, academic misconduct assistance with communication skills is available on the
Faculty website though http://www.ecm.uwa.edu.au/studentnet/exams
You are required to be aware of and fulfil your responsibilities under the Universitys rules,
policies and procedures so it is important that you review the content of these in detail.

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

UNIT COORDINATORS
Every unit has a person who is responsible for the overall administration of that unit. This person
is the Unit Coordinator. Your tutor is your first point of contact but if you have further queries
about this unit, you may wish to contact the Unit Coordinator.
Unit Coordinators:

Professor Caroline Baillie and Professor Anya Waite

Email:

ensc1001@uwa.edu.au

Building:

School of Environmental Systems Engineering M015

TEACHING TEAM
The team consists of Caroline Baillie and Anya Waite, as well the Information Session facilitators
and the Practical Workshop facilitators. You should note down the names of your faciliatators on
the next page.

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

RECORD THE NAMES OF THE TUTORS FOR YOUR INFORMATION

WORKSHOP AND PRACTICAL WORKSHOPS HERE:
Your tutor is your first point of contact for unit enquiries
INFORMATION SESSION FACILITATOR

Name:

Email:
Phone:
Fax:
Building:
Room:
Contact Hours:

PRACTICAL WORKSHOP FACILITATOR

Name:

Email:
Phone:
Fax:
Building:
Room:
Contact Hours:

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

INTRODUCTION
This unit lies at the start of your pathway towards becoming an Engineer. Engineers conceive
ways to re-arrange objects, materials and systems to achieve beneficial outcomes. There are
many personal and professional skills which need to be gained in order to make use of the
technical knowledge you have learned/will learn in other courses and to apply these to real
projects.
In this course you will study a real project in one of three geo-political contexts working in
collaboration with a range of non-government organizations. This year you will be working on
waste management one of the most significant and complex Global Challenges. The three
contexts are: Buenos Aires in Argentina, working with an organization called Waste for Life; the
hill regions of Nepal working with Engineers without Borders and Nepal Water for Health
(NEWAH); and the city of Perth in Western Australia working with Garbologies.
You will learn how a social, cultural and historical context influences the objectives, the process
and the outcomes. You will learn to work in small engineering teams with distributed expertise:
no one person knows enough to reach the objective alone so members of the team have to rely
on working together to complete the project successfully. You will also develop social interaction
and other communication skills that form the foundations of professional practice.

LEARNING OUTCOMES
1. Develop communication skills: including accurate, active listening (note taking, acquiring
language and terminology of the speaker), seeing (sketching, visual representation) reading, and
comprehension skills, oral and written presentation skills, the ability to clearly and concisely
communicate the results of a project, learn how to learn and teach others. (E)
2. Develop enquiry skills: including the ability the critique the historical function of engineering and
its role in society, to appreciate and critique common ways of thinking, researching and practicing
engineering as well as common modes of discourse. (T)
3. Develop team work skills: including the development of a cooperative relationship with peers
and experts in order to obtain information and assistance when needed, to become aware of
distributed expertise/ co-ordination, to develop the ability to work well in multidisciplinary and
multicultural teams and understand the role as team leader and player, and to manage effectively
with dysfunctional teams and resolve conflicts. (T)
4. Develop project management skills: including the ability to plan projects efficiently and
effectively, as well as time management. (T)
5. Develop literacy skills: including the ability to source, critique, assess reliability of, and potential
bias of information from a variety of sources and properly reference these. (T)
6. Demonstrate enhanced creative thinking and appreciate the barriers to creative thought. (E)
7. Demonstrate sensitivity and inclusivity towards cultural and gender diversity especially in
relation to Indigenous knowledge values and culture. (S)
8. Develop the ability to critique, analyse the risk and synthesise data related to environmental,
legal, ethical, health and safety impacts of engineering, (E)
9. Develop a critical understanding of sustainability including the ability to apply that
understanding throughout a project life cycle (E)
10. Develop an understanding of the environmental, social and economic context in which
engineering is practiced. (E)
11. Develop the ability to recognise and diagnose common failure modes of tools, components,
structures and materials. (E)
12. Appreciate the difference between ill-structured and well-structured engineering problems and
demonstrate the ability to frame an ill-structured design problem in terms of functions, objectives
and constraints. (T).
13. Identify critical design parameters and understand their use in guiding design decisions. (T)
14. Utilise a systematic method for qualitatively evaluating a range of alternative design candidate
solutions. (T)
Figures in brackets refer to the expected level gained in the course:

Scoping level (S). Basic entry level the student will be exploring what the capability
means and what might be possible. No demonstrable ability necessarily developed e.g.

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

student begins to understand that communication skills are required for engineers but
does not actually develop these skills in the unit.
Enabling level (E). Some basic abilities are developed without reference to meaning or
context e.g. student can present a powerpoint slide talk
Training level (T). Specific abilities are developed which relate to the context e.g.
students develop the ability to write an engineering report and present engineering data.
Relating level (R). Here the student will begin to develop a relation between the meaning
and context e.g. student will develop the skills to alter the way they present data when
discussing with local farmers, technicians or other engineering professionals.

LEARNING ACTIVITIES
The course is divided into three sections: Conceive, Design, Build
1. Conceive in this section students will learn the skills required to plan a project and to
create a problem brief. This is a critical stage so that you are actually working on the
right problem.
Week 1
Orientation Lecture (no workshop sessions)
Week 2
Information Session 1
Practical Workshop 1
Week 3
Information Session 2

Project planning/design
StudySmarter; Safety Induction; Introduction to Mini Design
Project

Practical Workshop 2

Environment - general introduction followed by brief for Buenos

Aires/Nepal/Perth.
Analysing Design Briefs; conclude Mini Design Project

Week 4
Information Session 3
Practical Workshop 3

Communication 1
Discuss potential solutions to waste problems in your context.

2. Design in this section you will learn to develop design skills and creative thinking and
begin to consider the impact of their designs
Week 5
Information Session 4
Practical Workshop 4

Creative problem solving /teamwork

Oral presentation of Project Proposal; Hand in Project Proposal.

Week 6
Information Session 5
Practical Workshop 5

Social Impact I
Project design work

Week 7
Information Session 6
Practical Workshop 6

Sustainability
Project design work

Week 8
Information Session 7
Practical Workshop 7

Social Impact 2
Project design work

3. Build building models where possible and considering impact and implications of
the design in the context
Week 9
Information Session 8
Practical Session 8

Diversity
Build

Week 10
Information Session 9

Communication 2

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

Practical Session 9

Week 11
Information Session 10
Practical Session 10
Week 12
Information Session 11
Practical Session 11

Build

Ethics and Justice

Build and Testing

Preparation for Final Report & Oral Presentation; Self and Peer
Evaluation of Input into Final Report
Evaluation of design

Week 13
Project presentations during Information Session

TIMETABLE OF LEARNING ACTIVITIES

Week 1 commencing
Feb 24
Week 2
March 3
Week 3
March 10
Week 4
March 17
Week 5
March 24

Week 6
Mach 31
Week 7 *
April 7
Week 8 #
April 14
Week 9
April 28
Week 10
May 5
Week 11
May 12
Week 12
May 19
Week 13
May 26

Information Session
Practical Session
th
Orientation Lecture (Tuesday 25 February, Octagon Lecture Theatre,
1.00pm)
Information Session 1
Practical Workshop1
Project Planning
Information Session 2
Practical Workshop 2
Waste, Environment & Society
Information Session 3
Practical Workshop 3
Communication 1
Information Session 4
Practical Workshop 4
Creative Problem Solving &
Oral presentation of project
Teamwork
proposal; hand in Project
Proposal
Information Session 5
Practical Workshop 5
Social Impact 1
Information Session 6
Practical Workshop 6
Sustainability
Information Session 7
Practical Workshop 7
Social Impact 2
Health, Safety & Risk
Non-teaching study break April 21-25
Information Session 8
Practical Workshop 8
Diversity
Information Session 9
Practical Workshop 9
Communication 2
Information Session 10
Practical Workshop 10
Ethics & Justice
Information Session 11
Practical Workshop 11
Preparation for final Report
Project Presentations
Oral presentation, hand in final report

th

*Note: Wednesday 9 April: Information and Practical Sessions will be held as normal on the
morning of PROSH; students who participate in PROSH will be expected to attend other sessions
during the week
th
# Note: Friday 18 is Good Friday which is a University Public Holiday

STUDENT FEEDBACK
Each student will be in a class of 20-25 with one information tutor and one practical workshop
tutor through the course. The tutors will be responsible for ensuring that feedback is given in a
timely manner and in not more than two weeks after submission of the work.

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

TEXT BOOK & RESOURCES

All resources for this course will be provided in a Course Reader, and on the Learning
Management System (LMS). The Course Reader is available for sale in the Co-op Bookshop. If
you choose not to purchase the Course Reader, you will be expected to download the Information
Session guidelines and handouts, and bring hard copies with you each week.

ASSESSMENT DETAILS
Assessment Mechanism
The assessment for this unit consists of the following items.
Assessment Tasks

Attendance and Participation in

Workshops

Weekly Progress Reports

Project proposal and oral

presentation

Final Report

Oral presentation on team project

Worth

Due

15%

Ongoing

15%

Weekly

10%

Week 5

50%

Week 13

10%

Week 13

100%

TOTAL

Attendance and participation (15%)

Attendance at Information and Practical Workshops is compulsory. If you are unable to attend
either of these sessions, you must notify your Tutor in advance and provide a medical certificate
or other documentation which explains your absence. If you miss more than 2 tutorials, you are
liable to fail this unit and will need to submit a Special Consideration form to the ECM Student
Office. You will also gain extra marks for active participation and evidence that you have done
any preparatory work for the session.
Weekly Progress Reports (15%)
Individual members of the Project Team will take turns to submit a weekly progress report. This is
a brief statement (no more than 2 pages) which should address the following issues:
1.
2.
3.
4.

Progress to date
Issues arising and mechanisms to address these
Reflection on process of teamwork
Questions

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

The guidelines and marking criteria for writing the Progress Report are included in the Course
Reader (under the Assessment section) and in the Course Materials folder on LMS.
Project proposal and first oral presentation (10%)
Each team will submit a project proposal according to the Unit guidelines in Week 5 (Practical
Workshop 4). Students will be also required to give a five minute team presentation, discussing
their project proposal (each student must speak). You will receive critique and feedback from the
other teams.
The marking criteria used for both the oral presentation and the project proposal are listed in the
Course Reader (under the Assessment section) and in the Assessment Folder on LMS.
NB: All team members will receive the same mark for their project proposal and their oral
presentation.
Project report (50%)
The final report is due in the Information Session in the final week of the course. The guidelines
for writing the report, and the marking criteria, are included in the Course Reader and in the
Assessment Folder on LMS. Use the Cover Sheet provided in the Assessment Folder on LMS.
NB: Team members may not receive the same mark for the Project Report. You will be expected
to indicate which member of the team wrote which sections of the Report, either in the Table of
Contents or on a separate section of the Report. If there is evidence of equal contribution in a) the
Self & Peer Evaluation feedback and b) in the Project Report, then all team members will receive
the same mark. Otherwise marks will be adjusted accordingly.
Final Oral presentation (10%)
Project teams will give a ten-minute presentation on their design solution (as set out in their
Project Report). Arrive at your final Information Session as early as possible to ensure you can
prepare your model/prototype for display during your presentation in a timely fashion. Team
members will receive a group mark for their final oral presentation.

Academic Conduct
Academic Conduct Essentials
Academic Conduct Essentials (ACE) is a compulsory online module for all students about ethical
scholarship and the expectations of correct academic conduct that UWA has of its students.
All students at any level who are enrolled into a UWA course, are required to complete this
online module. It is accessible through the Learning Management System
https://www.lms.uwa.edu.au/login.php
To find out more about Academic Integrity, look at these useful resources:

Student Services, who run workshops on how to utilise sources:

http://www.studentservices.uwa.edu.au/ss/learning

http://www.ryerson.ca/academicintegrity/index.html a series of flash videos from a

Canadian University exploring Academic Integrity

http://www.lc.unsw.edu.au/onlib/plag.html which takes you to an on-line quiz where you

test your understanding of plagiarism, and where there are links to other universities
academic integrity pages.

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ENSC1001 Unit Outline

STUDENTS RIGHTS AND RESPONSIBILITIES

It is the responsibility of every student to be aware of all relevant legislation, policies and
procedures relating to their rights and responsibilities as a student. These include:

the Student Charter,

the Universitys Guiding Ethical Principles,

the Universitys policy and statements on plagiarism and academic integrity,

copyright principles and responsibilities,

the Universitys policies on appropriate use of software and computer facilities,

the use of calculators in exams

students responsibility to check enrolment,

deadlines, appeals, and grievance resolution,

student feedback,

other policies and procedures

electronic communication with students

See http://www.ecm.uwa.edu.au/studentnet/exams for comprehensive information regarding the

aforementioned points.
The Student Guild employs a number of Education Officers who provide information, support and
advocacy with a range of academic matters.
Visit http://www.guild.uwa.edu.au/home/student_assistance/academic_help or in person at:
Guild Student Centre
Opening Hours:
Location:
Mailing Address:
Phone:
Fax:
Email (general):
Email (confidential):

8.30am - 5.00pm, Monday to Friday

Ground floor, Guild Village, near BankWest ATM machine.
M300, 35 Stirling Highway, Crawley Western Australia 6009
+61 8 6488 2295
+61 8 6488 1200
enquiries@guild.uwa.edu.au
education@guild.uwa.edu.au

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION
If you have a query relating to this unit (that cannot be answered by your tutor) please contact the
Unit Support team at ensc1001@uwa.edu.au
If you have a query relating to other matters such as:
Requests for deferment of study
Missing part of Semester
Applying for Special Consideration
Please contact:
ECM Student Office
Opening Hours:
Location:
Phone:
Email:

8.30am - 5.00pm
Ground floor, Civil and Mechanical Engineering Building (facing James
Oval).
+61 8 6488 3061
enquiries-ecm@uwa.edu.au

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