TY - CHAP A1 - Diehl, Andreas A1 - Wolff, Lilli A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Niemetz, Michael A1 - Mörtlbauer, Stefanie A1 - Dirnberger, Sandra T1 - Compact Freshmen Welcome Seminar for Engineering Students T2 - Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences N2 - The Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Information Technology of the OTH Regensburg developed and implemented a compact freshmen seminar for the afternoon of the first day of study. The intention of this seminar is to help the freshmen during their transition between school and study without losing lecture time in the first semester. The concept was tested with one small study group at the beginning of the summer semester 2015. To rate the impact of the seminar and to find aspects for continuous improvement an evaluation method was developed and used. Due to the good student resonance during the first run, this introduction seminar was held again in the winter semester 2015/16. It is planned to integrate this seminar as a regular session for all freshmen of the faculty curriculum and monitor the long-term effects of student motivation and success. KW - Engineering Education KW - Freshmen Seminar Y1 - 2016 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:bvb:898-opus4-31034 N1 - Corresponding author: Thomas Fuhrmann IS - 228 SP - 45 EP - 52 PB - Elsevier ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Farmbauer, Michael A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Integrating GNU Radio into a Virtual Course about Communication Systems T2 - 44th International Convention on Information, Communication and Electronic Technology (MIPRO): 27.09. - 01.10.2021, Opatija, Croatia N2 - Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the course Communication Systems was transferred from presence to a virtual lecture. No hands-on lab experiments were possible. Therefore, a GNU Radio practical part was integrated into the lecture. A tutorial was written to guide students through the first steps with GNU Radio to decrease initial problems and increase student motivation. Several examples were given regarding digital signal processing, analogue and digital modulation and demodulation. Software Defined Radio receivers were set up in the amateur radio lab of the university and connected to the internet so that students were able to get real radio data to be analyzed and demodulated with their own GNU Radio models. This enables a knowledge transfer from simulated signal processing to the analysis and demodulation of real live signals. Students showed medium to high interest in practical examples during the lectures and tried their own GNU Radio simulations. Overall, the integration of GNU Radio and Software Defined Radio receivers into this virtual lecture gave additional benefits for the students to deal with signal processing and demodulation experiments. It is planned to use GNU Radio in the future for complementary practical examples to the hands-on experiments in the lab. KW - Communication engineering education KW - Communication systems KW - Data models KW - Digital modulation KW - Digital signal processing KW - GNU Radio KW - Pandemics KW - radio communication KW - Receivers KW - Software Defined Radio Y1 - 2021 SN - 978-953-233-101-1 U6 - https://doi.org/10.23919/MIPRO52101.2021.9596700 SP - 1565 EP - 1570 PB - IEEE ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Altmann, Andreas A1 - Birkner, Wolfgang A1 - Häckl, Franz-Xaver A1 - Hanner, Christopher A1 - Liebhart, Peter A1 - Metschl, Samuel A1 - Weck, Florian A1 - Farmbauer, Michael A1 - Heiß, Manfred A1 - Cuno, H.-H. A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Mandl, Roland A1 - Mottok, Jürgen A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Payload development and launch of a stratosphere balloon mission T2 - IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON 2014), 3-5 April 2014, Istanbul, Turkey N2 - During a student project a stratosphere balloon was developed and launched. This project included the definition of the balloon parameters and the scientific instruments for performing atmospheric measurements, the development of all mechanical and electronic parts, the administration of the project as well as the management tasks related to the balloon launch. The main challenge for the students was the high complexity of the project due to tasks involving many different knowledge domains and the long project duration from the initial definition to the launch. Y1 - 2014 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1109/EDUCON.2014.6826065 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Niemetz, Michael A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Farmbauer, Michael T1 - Comprehensive Amateur Radio Education including Public Outreach T2 - IEEE Integrated STEM Education Conference (ISEC), 16-16 March 2019, Princeton, NJ, USA N2 - An amateur radio lecture was developed and is conducted within the general education program of the Ostbayerische Technische Hochschule Regensburg. This course enables the students to participate in a variety of activities within the university. Different learning formats for communication engineering are carried out in combination with an amateur radio station of the university. Additionally, some of the projects serve as anchor points for increased visibility of the university in local society, e.g. by carrying out public events in connection with the local amateur radio community. It is seen that this course together with the amateur radio station have several positive effects for technical education and university visibility. KW - Amateur Radio KW - Antennas KW - Communication engineering education KW - Conferences KW - Education KW - Education Outreach KW - Licenses KW - PROPAGATION KW - radio communication KW - STEM Education Program Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1109/ISECon.2019.8882078 SP - 98 EP - 103 PB - IEEE ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Planned Chaos in Electrical Engineering Education T2 - 6th International Conference on Higher Education Advances (HEAd'20): 02.06.2020 - 05.06.2020, Valencia N2 - This paper presents the idea to intentionally introduce planned chaos into electrical engineering lectures and lab courses to improve students’ learning success. The reason to present this idea are several personal experiences in daily teaching. If students experience some uncertainty in their study program, it is seen that they have higher challenges and therefore higher learning success in managing uncertain situations. In these ways, students acquire methodical and social competences to deal with uncertainty and achieve productive results in an unstable working environment. If, however, the chaos is too large, students are over-strained with the situation, distracted from the actual learning targets and consequently learning results will be worse, drop-out rates will increase and they will be frustrated. The beneficial level of uncertainty depends on the student culture, academic progress and personality characteristics. The competence to deal with complex situations is essential for later professional life where unexpected circumstances occur regularly. Introducing planned chaos into lectures and lab courses has not to be confused with a missing didactic concept and is no justification for a bad preparation. Planned chaos is a demanding concept for professors to find the right implementation for an optimized learning outcome. These described findings are experienced from practical work and student evaluations. KW - Active Learning KW - Electrical engineering education KW - Planned Chaos Y1 - 2020 SN - 9788490488119 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4995/head20.2020.10989 PB - Universitat Politècnica de València ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Steinkirchner, Alfons A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Channel Coded Processor for Enhanced Safety JF - International Journal of Future Computer and Communication (IJFCC) N2 - Several concepts are known for improving processor safety, all of them having their pros and cons. Some are very resource intensive, others have limited capabilities regarding the provided error safety. In this paper we use research on channel coding of noisy communication channels known from communication theory as an analogy to random bit errors in processors. We incorporate this knowledge into processor design to suggest a new error correction concept by using channel coding in processors. The new concept of a Channel Coded Processor could provide effective implementation of redundancy by the channel coding that enables error correction. The concept could also create a complete chain of redundancy in all areas and components of the processor ranging from the code compiler through the processing hardware to the output of the information. KW - Channel coded processor concept KW - communication theory KW - safety KW - soft error Y1 - 2017 U6 - https://doi.org/10.18178/ijfcc.2017.6.2.489 SN - 2010-3751 VL - 6 IS - 2 SP - 58 EP - 62 PB - International Association of Computer Science and Information CY - Singapore ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Transdisciplinary Bachelor Course Connecting Business and Electrical Engineering T2 - 4th International Conference on Higher Education Advances (HEAd'18), 2018, Universitat Politècnica de València, València N2 - The OTH Regensburg has a broad variety of study programs in technical, business, social and health sciences. Up to now there is no integral connection in the bachelor curricula between business and technical faculties except for some small subjects. The scope of this project is to develop a new course specialization which connects engineering and business thinking. Electrical engineering students should learn basics of business science and how managers think. Business students should vice versa learn fundamentals of engineering and how engineers solve problems. Students from both faculties work together in projects where they act like start-up companies developing a new product and bringing it into the market. It is seen a transdisciplinary effect: These projects gain innovative results between the disciplines compared to student projects of one isolated discipline. Evaluation results from the first two cohorts indicate high student satisfaction, high learning success as well as directions for further improvement. KW - Business Education KW - Engineering Education KW - Project Based Learning KW - Transdisciplinary Education Y1 - 2018 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4995/HEAd18.2018.8056 ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Niemetz, Michael A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas T1 - Wie können wir Professorinnen und Professoren ein überfachliches Studium vermitteln? T2 - Tagungsband zum 3. Symposium zur Hochschullehre in den MINT-Fächern (MINT-Symposium), Nürnberg 25. und 26.09.2017 N2 - Die Transdisziplinarität ist als wichtiger Innovationsmotor in aller Munde, entstehen doch an den Schnittstellen und in den Zwischenräumen der etablierten Wissenschaften neue Ideen und damit die zukünftige Wertschöpfung unserer Industrie. Wir alle wurden in der Welt von gestern sozialisiert, für die meisten Tätigkeiten in der Industrie war tiefes und spezialisiertes Fachwissen essentiell und auch ausreichend. Wir wurden zu Spezialisten ausgebildet und aufgrund dieser Kompetenz in der Arbeitswelt geschätzt und auch auf unsere Professuren berufen. Doch ist dies eine ausreichende Basis, um unsere Absolventinnen und Absolventen auf die neue komplexe Welt ubiquitär verfügbaren und durchsuchbaren Wissens adäquat vorzubereiten? Können wir mit unserem Mindset aus der Vergangenheit die benötigten überfachlichen Kompetenzen für die Zukunft vermitteln? Diese selbstkritische Auseinandersetzung ist schmerzhaft, doch nur durch diese Analyse können wir unsere alten Denkmuster in engen Fachdisziplinen ablegen und zu einem neuen vernetzten Denken für eine zukunftsgerichtete Lehre kommen. Y1 - 2017 UR - https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323119092_Wie_konnen_wir_Professorinnen_und_Professoren_ein_uberfachliches_Studium_vermitteln UR - https://didaktikzentrum.de/images/cwattachments/381_c76aeb3b834947e657aef252c88f6e62.pdf ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Blank, M. A1 - Brunner, Stefan A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Meier, Hans A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Embedded Linux in engineering education T2 - 2015 IEEE Global Engineering Education Conference (EDUCON), 18-20 March 2015, Tallinn, Estonia N2 - With the availability of cost effective embedded Linux solutions and the increasing complexity of embedded devices because of growing calculation power and communication demand, Linux is getting increasingly interesting as an operating system for the design of embedded control solutions. This is the case for almost all technical applications in electrical engineering like energy distribution systems, high level communication, signal processing or industrial automation. In the engineering master courses at the OTH Regensburg, a lecture is offered introducing students to Linux with a strong focus on embedded applications. This paper describes the concept of the lecture including the laboratory set up and gives some examples of embedded Linux projects performed by students. KW - Engineering Education KW - Linux KW - Operating systems KW - Ports (Computers) KW - Universal Serial Bus KW - Vehicles KW - Wireless communication Y1 - 2015 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1109/EDUCON.2015.7095964 SP - 145 EP - 150 PB - IEEE ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Ideas on Digitally Supported Individualization of Teaching and Learning for Evolving Competency Requirements T2 - Ninth International Conference on Higher Education Advances (HEAd 23), València, June 19, 2023 – June 22, 2023 N2 - The world is changing rapidly, mainly due to the digitalization of all areas of living. A huge amount of information is accessible via the Internet, and since it is no longer possible for individual humans to keep track of it, artificial intelligence (AI) is analyzing this data. In this rapidly changing world, students have to be educated for a successful career during their whole working life. These boundary conditions lead to completely new challenges for the education of students that are unprecedented in this form. Digitalization in education can help to cope with these challenges but can only be a means, not a goal. Personal interaction with students remains the most important task in education to address individual weaknesses and further develop strengths and talents. With the increasing amount of openly available information and the consequently increasing diversity of experiences within the group of students, differentiation is advancing to become the key to successful education. Digitization can help with this challenging task and support communication between students and their experienced instructors. But computers cannot replace human interaction and attempts to improve teaching efficiency by replacing this communication with electronic means endangers the learning success for complex concepts. This article analyzes education demands and possibilities for digitally supported teaching and learning. KW - Digitalization KW - higher education KW - student competencies KW - differentiation Y1 - 2023 U6 - https://doi.org/10.4995/HEAd23.2023.16232 SN - 2603-5871 SP - 1399 EP - 1406 PB - Universitat Polit`ecnica de Val`encia ER - TY - CHAP A1 - Fuhrmann, Thomas A1 - Niemetz, Michael T1 - Analysis and Improvement of Engineering Exams Toward Competence Orientation by Using an AI Chatbot T2 - Towards a Hybrid, Flexible and Socially Engaged Higher Education: Proceedings of the 26th International Conference on Interactive Collaborative Learning (ICL2023), Volume 1 N2 - ChatGPT is currently one of the most advanced general chatbots. This development leads to diverse challenges in higher education, like new forms of teaching and learning, additional exam methods, new possibilities for plagiarism, and many more topics. On the other side with the development of advanced AI tools, pure knowledge will be less and less important, and demands from industry will change toward graduates with higher competencies. Education has therefore to be changed from knowledge-centered toward competence centered. The goal of this article is to use ChatGPT for analyzing and improving the competence orientation of exams in engineering education. The authors use ChatGPT to analyze exams from different engineering subjects to evaluate the performance of this chatbot and draw conclusions about the competence orientation of the tested exams. The obtained information is used to develop ideas for increasing the competence orientation of exams. From this analysis, it is visible that ChatGPT gives good performance mainly where knowledge is tested. It has, however, much more problems with transfer questions or tasks where students need creativity or complex insights for finding new solutions. Based on this result, exams and also lectures can be optimized toward competence orientation. KW - Engineering education KW - Competence orientation KW - Exam analysis KW - AI chatbot KW - ChatGPT Y1 - 2024 SN - 9783031519789 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-51979-6_42 SN - 2367-3370 SP - 403 EP - 411 PB - Springer Nature CY - Cham ER -