
Experiential Engineering Education
From Quill to Print: 3D Printing & Renaissance Literatures
How to make engineering design fun? How to effectively employ knowledge and skills acquired in the classroom within a practical, real-world context? We believe it is imperative for engineers to transcend conventional disciplinary boundaries and work with those who have different educational backgrounds. Partnering with faculties from UTSA College of Liberal and Fine Arts (Xiaoyi Zhang and Sue Hum) and UTSA College of Business (Henry Shu), we have been running a semester-long experimental class project every Fall since 2022, aiming to create a hands-on experience by simulating a real-world "client – engineer – writer / marketer interaction." Engineering students from Materials Science and Engineering class collaborate with Humanities students from Renaissance Literature classes such as “Visions of Hell and the Afterlife—Dante’s Inferno” and “Shakespeare Late Plays” to design a multimedia product based on a signature scene in The Divine Comedy or a Shakespearean play, combining 3D printing stage props, live performance, creative visual art, narrative storytelling, as well as marketing analysis. Check out our previous projects below, along with our Instagram and UTSA Today news.
Selected publications
(1) Zhang, X., Aviles Vargas, A., Sun, G. (2024, March), 3D Shakespeare: A Transdisciplinary Activity to Enhance Real-World Learning Experience in Engineering and Humanities Education Paper presented at 2024 ASEE-GSW, Canyon, Texas. 10.18260/1-2—45362
2024
2023
