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ENGINEERING MAGAZINE
VoL, XXXV. JUNE, 1908. No. 3.
Vol. 35, No.3
https://archive.org/stream/sim_industrial-management-1916_engineering-magazine_1908-06_35_3/sim_industrial-management-1916_engineering-magazine_1908-06_35_3_djvu.txt
VoL. XXXIV. FEBRUARY, 1908. No. 5.
https://archive.org/stream/sim_industrial-management-1916_engineering-magazine_1908-02_34_5/sim_industrial-management-1916_engineering-magazine_1908-02_34_5_djvu.txt
349 - 362
A FOUR-YEARS COURSE IN INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING.
By Hugo Diemer.
Tue ENGINEERING Magaztne has long urged that modern conditions of engineering employment demanded modifications in the scheme of engineering education. In the words of a writer reviewed in our March issue, many of the subjects included in the standard courses have not been taught as they must be practiced, and the entire scheme needs to be brought closer to life. Especially has provision been lacking for the large proportion of engineering graduates whose future work lies in the intelligent, efficient direction of manufacturing operations,
It is most gratifying to find that two of the great American Universities—Columbia and Harvard—are undertaking to solve the problem, one from the engineering and the other from the economic side. This notable movement, and the present season of special interest in the college year, make this article by Professor Diemer, of the Pennsylvania State Col- lege, peculiarly timely. It is a concrete presentation of a proposal for a course preparing the student for industrial work, and merits the attention due to pioneer effort. Next month Professor Rautenstrauch, of Columbia, will discuss the plan here outlined and will give the added interest of another advanced viewpoint.—Tne Eprrors.
SINCE the introduction of manual training into public schools there has been considerable argument whether a school educa- tion is to prepare the student to make a living, or whether it is to prepare him for life. Evidently he must be prepared for both.
It is becoming more and more generally recognized that manual training may well be given a place for its cultural value and that for this reason it may with advantage be given to all classes of pupils in the elementary schools. It is also becoming just as generally recog- nized that manual training as taught in the general cultural school cannot take the place of vocational industrial education.
The low efficiency of the craftsmen in various trades in America is becoming a cause of concern not only to employers and owners of industries, but to the leaders of organized labor as well. The tend- ency toward specialization makes it well-nigh impossible for appren- tices to get a good general knowledge of their trade such as was in former years quite possible. In his striving for variety of experi- ence, the young tradesman is perforce compelled to adopt a nomadic life, changing jobs and places of residence,—a process that not many can follow advantageously.
It has been noted and commented on that tradesmen coming to the United States from Germany are better all-around workers in their craft than the average of Americans in the same occupation.
The German “continuation” schools, or trades schools, are largely responsible for this superiority, The Germans compel all children to attend the general-culture schools until they reach the age of four- teen years. In the general-culture schools they also receive manual- training exercises intended for general education. In the “continua- tion” schools the instruction is by skilled tradesmen, and in them one may learn to be a brick-layer, a plasterer, a carpenter, a lock-smith, a painter, a motor-man, and so on, receiving a thorough two-years trade-school training by experts in the trade.
We need a similar system of vocational schools in America in which we may prepare our young workingmen to be better workers, to be more skilful and less wasteful. The protestations of Mr, Crane of Chicago are not without reason, in that he like many others sees disadvantages in too great expenditure on higher technical education with no corresponding outlay in trade training for those who cannot attend the public schools longer than their fourteenth year.
Hand-in-hand with the secondary school system we need a further more advanced class of vocational schools for such students as have completed their general-culture high-school course at the age of eigh- teen and wish to spend not over two years in becoming proficient in one of the more advanced trades. In this second class of trade schools there could be taught such occupations as lithography, print- ing and other crafts of higher order, Such vocational training would not need to interfere with the sort of manual training which is now given in high schools and which should be continued as general cul- tural education. Such manual training should be given students in all courses so that they may have trained eyes and hands and may know the elements of wood and metal working, of domestic science, and of the arts and crafts in general.
Having thus provided for those students who cannot go to school beyond the periods of primary or secondary education respectively, by giving them an opportunity in separate schools, to gain vocational training also, we can keep our general primary and secondary school curricula free from vocational studies and can devote them wholly to the work that will best prepare for citizenship and for life in its broadest sense, and can retain still a section in our secondary schools for such preparatory studies as are needed by those students propos- ing to take a college course.
At first sight it would appear that we might continue this simple system into the realm of higher education, offering a four-years course in arts to those who could continue their general cultural edu- cation to the age of twenty-two, and then offering a vocational tech- nical course to the graduate from the school of arts, or “college.”
There are relatively few students who take first a course in arts and then follow it by a technical course, and the larger proportion of these few are those who take up the study of law or medicine. In en-gineering it is important that a continuous line of training be un- broken, and the consequence has been that we have tried to establish in our engineering courses a certain degree of general cultural train- ing. Yet the more specialized technical portions of the engineering courses demand practically all the student’s time, so that he cannot spend much effort on general culture, and the result is that after four- years time almost all the emphasis has been on technical specialization, and little if any time has been devoted towards training for life and citizenship.
To be sure, the greatest demand made on engineering schools thus far by students, their parents, and their employers, has been for tech-nical specialists, and the need will always exist for four-year courses which are extremely specialized technically and which prepare the graduates to become chief chemists, head electricians, chief drafts- men, and designers. But there is also a need for men so trained that they can be developed to fill positions in industrial management in such a manner that they are serving the interests of all concerned, namely the purchasers, the men employed in the industry, and the small as well as the large stockholders.
America was never more in need of men trained for industrial leadership than she is today. Her industries are suffering on account of the lack of such men—men who are not only thoroughly familar with productive processes, but who have broad human interests and are at the same time thorough business men.
Hitherto courses for educating mechanical engineers have con- cerned themselves primarily with the processes of designing and test- ing. The existing courses are admirably adapted to fit men for these processes. The manufacturing industries, however, are in need of men who know how to produce more economically. As America’s natural resources diminish and approach more nearly these of foreign competitors, she is compelled to be less wasteful in manufacturing processes. Moreover, she must look for foreign trade to a much greater extent than hitherto.
In the past so large a proportion of the technical graduates have found employment in the large electrical and engineering corporations that the smaller industries of America have not availed themselves of the services of technically trained men to any considerable extent. Yet the most wasteful power plants, the most inefficient manufac- turing processes, the most uneconomical building arrangements, and poorest organization methods, are found in the smaller industries, The opportunity for much greater profit and greater comfort to employees as well as greater peace of mind to the owners exists here. The owners of the smaller industries should appreciate the fact that tech- nically trained men can be employed in many cases at not much higher wages than must be paid for men without such special training, who cannot develop with a growing business as well as the technically trained young man can,
A young graduate, no matter what his course of study has been, will of course not be able to revolutionize matters shortly after his employment in such an industry. Yet he should be able to save his wages many times over from the very beginning if he has been prop- erly educated. On the other hand, the young technical graduates should be more willing to put up with the greater disadvantages they would at first encounter in entering the employ of smaller industries instead of the larger corporations. Life during the first few years of one’s experience as an employee of the large corporation is apt to be more pleasant on account of social contact with other young college graduates, than would be his experience as an employee of a small industrial establishment, but in the long run his chances for independ- ence and leadership are greater in the smaller establishment. Yet the possibility of leadership has been overlooked in the strictly tech- nical curricula. The true function of the technical school of college grade should be to develop not only technical specialists, but superin- tendents, managers, and leaders in general.
The relative proportion of technical-college graduates to the num- ber of graduates from secondary and primary schools is so small that we can legitimately adapt our technical-college courses to prepare their graduates to fill the higher places. If we adopt this policy for the higher schools, then we must provide for vocational technical schools for the graduates from primary and secondary general-cul- ture schools. When we have once provided these vocational schools, the place and aim of the college technical school will be unquestioned.
It must train for leadership.
Now that all America is pausing and trying to find the causes of the sudden financial and industrial depression, we are beginning to realize that we have been wasteful and inefficient in our manufactur- ing and construction processes, and that too often endeavor has been made to conceal this wastefulness by skilfully complex business state- ments, and to cover it up by sales of new stock, bonds, and other se- curities. We are beginning to realize that we must become more economical and more efficient in our manufacturing processes and business methods, and that we must know enough about accountants’ and auditors’ statements to know exactly what they do mean. One of the natural results of this present depression will be a demand for men who can make industrial enterprises really pay—not only on paper, but actually and permanently. We need to educate men to meet this demand.
The men we must provide must be trained in three distinct lines.
They must be thoroughly grounded in engineering.
They must have creative ability in applying good statistical, accounting, and “system” methods to production; and,
finally, they must know something about men, so that they may develop in themselves the ability to stimulate ambition, and know how to exercise discipline with firmness and at the same time with sufficient kindness to insure the good-will and co-operation of all.
The more thoroughly the graduate of a course intended for leadership is versed in questions of practical economics and sociology, the better prepared will he be to meet the problems that will daily confront him.
In such a course, education in commerce, statistics, and economics and sociology should go hand-in-hand with engineering education, As at present constituted, our college courses permit such training only for the students taking a college course in arts first and an engineer- ing course afterwards, or vice versa—a procedure which very few fol- low. It is possible, however, to co-ordinate the essentials, as above enumerated, in a special four-years course.
By comparing the courses in mechanical engineering as now given in a number of representative American engineering schools, it will be seen that the amount of time devoted to any one branch and to groups of allied branches differs widely, so that if one will take the average time devoted to engineering fundamentals in these schools, and then note the minimum time devoted to these same fundamentals by certain successful institutions, it appears that without even con- fining one’s self to the minimum times, a schedule of fundamentals in engineering could be laid out that would still leave available a con- siderable part of the four-years course for those branches which would train the graduate for industrial management.
The chart on pages 354-355 shows the relative times devoted to various branches by twelve representative American schools in. their course in mechanical engineering.
The unit of time devoted to any one subject or group of subjects is the “semester-hour” or “semester-period,” being the equivalent of one hour of recitation work per week for one semester or half-year. Thus, in a class which meets three times a week for recitations in a branch which continues for one semester, the credit would be three periods, The column headed Recitation—Practicum, Relative Value, refers to the relative value assigned by the different schools to one hour of recitation as compared to one hour of practicum—viz., labora- tory or drafting room or shop. Thus 1/3 would indicate that three hours of practicum work are required for a unit credit. |
In the case of Worcester Polytechnic Institute the upper series of figures express the units as used at that institution, which differ from the notation just indicated in that they give the unit of value to one hour per week for one semester of practicum work, and each hour of recitation or lecture attendance is considered as requiring two addi- tional hours of outside work, and the latter are thus given a credit of three units. The lower set of figures opposite Worcester are however reduced to percentage of total credit.
The system at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is simi- lar, but there the total hours which a man spends in class, shop, and preparation are counted. Thus a recitation coming one hour per week for a semester of, say, sixteen weeks, would receive a credit of the recitation hours plus the preparation hours multiplied by the num- ber of weeks, or one hour recitation plus two hours preparation (viz., three hours) multiplied by sixteen, or forty-eight units credit. The upper figures opposite “M. I. T.” are expressed in the units used at that institution. The lower figures are reduced to percentage of total credit.
As the Ohio State University has three semesters or terms per annum, the credits must be multiplied by 2/3 to give their equivalent value.
There is room for some difference of opinion as to the title of the group heading under which certain branches are listed in the classi- fication. Thus under “Civil Engineering” are listed the branches of Hydraulics, Hydraulic Machinery, Masonry, Graphical Statics, Sur- veying, and Structures. This group is intended to cover the branches taught students in a mechanical-engineering course by instructors generally designated as instructors in “Civil Engineering.” Continu- ing this particular group as an illustration, it will be noticed that the average number of semester hours of these various branches in the civil-engineering group taught to students taking a mechanical-engi- neering course is 4.2; the highest is 7.3 and the lowest 1.4.
The writer is indebted to Mr. E. B. Norris, secretary of the schedule committee at Pennsylvania State College, for assistance in preparing this tabulation.
From time to time speakers at educational conventions have advo- cated the giving of instruction in branches that would train a tech- nical graduate for management. These speakers have always been met by the argument that the engineering courses are already over- crowded. An investigation of the subjects taught at these ten repre- sentative institutions reveals the fact however that there is wide varia- tion in the time devoted to any one subject. Evidently, a course in which the minimum time given by any representative school to a given purely engineering essential was used as the basis would be too light. However, a course can be prepared in which the essentials, such as mathematics, mechanics, and other fundamentals, are fully as strong in time as the average, and in which are omitted such courses as are not common to all. This would leave opportunity for insertion of the cultural studies. Such a four-years course is presented below.
4-Year Industrial Engineering Course - Proposal by Diemer
It will be noted that at the very beginning branches are inserted which awaken the student’s realization of the fact that human affairs constitute a most important part of life’s work. Beginning with his- tory in the freshman year, elements of political economy follow in the sophomore year, and more advanced courses in modern economics follow in each semester throughout the course. Accounting and business law and allied courses begin in the sophomore year, and accompany the work in economics in each semester following.
The regular mathematics of the engineering courses predominate, and are followed by kinematics, mechanics, and theory of structures. The fundamentals in judging materials are furnished in chemistry, qualitative and quantitative, engineering materials, metallurgy, and physics. Thus the student gets the really fundamental studies in engineering, omitting the descriptive and specialized technical branches.
In order that well-designed, safe, livable and attractive buildings shall appeal to the graduate, and that he may realize the effects of good buildings on economical production, he is taught graphics of structures, heating and ventilating, architectural drawing, and history of architecture.
The regular shop-work of the engineering courses is given, not quite so much time being devoted to this as in the mechanical-engineering courses. Sufficient steam- and electrical-laboratory work is given to familiarize the graduate with the elements of power-plant work. Such a course is believed to be far superior to the so-called business or commercial courses offered by a few of our larger universities at present, since the latter courses are deficient in omitting mathematics and engineering, thus only partially equipping the graduate and being themselves open to the same criticism as to one-sidedness that can be made of purely engineering courses.
COURSE IN INDUSTRIAL ENGINEERING.
FRESHMAN YEAR. First SEMESTER.
(Table needs rearrangement and editing)
Actual Hours. Credit Hours.
Mathematics (Trigonometry) .............0e00- 5 5
Drawing, Freehand and Geometric.............. 4 2 24 214
SECOND SEMESTER.
Mathematics (Amialytical) 5 5 25
SopHomore YEAR. First SEMESTER.
; Actual Hours. Credit Hours.
Elements of Political Economy.................. 4 4 gebra 3
French or German Conversation..............005 2 I 26
Seconp SEMESTER.
French or German 2 26 21%
2
Junior Year. SEMESTER.
Theory and History of Moncy..............000-
Steam Engines and Boilers.
Seconp SEMESTER.
History of Development of Industrial Society...
Manufactures of United States.................
Chemistry, Qualitative
SENIOR YEAR. First SEMESTER.
Industrial and Social History of the United States 3 3
Gas Engines, Refrigeration and Turbines........ 5 5
Qualitative Chemical Analysis..............se0e- 4 2 25 21
SECOND SEMESTER.
Factory Organization and Administration........ 3 3
Engineering Specifications ....... iaveasescaurucs 2 I
Fleating atid 2 2
Quantitative Chemical Analysis...............56 6 3
Engineering Materials
Metallurgy of Engineering Materials (2-0) f**** 3 3 29 20
Summarizing the proposed course by groups of studies, we have:
Group of SUBJECTS. Actual Semester Hours.
Economics, Accounting, and Jurisprudence....... 43
Machine Drawing and Kinematics............... 6
Mechanical Engineering, including Steam and 210
Credit Hours.
10
12
8
43
Expressing this in the nearest even percentage, omitting fractions, for comparison with the courses already established, we find the following results:
Group oF SUBJECTS. 12 REPRESENTA TIVE COURSES.
English and Modern Languages............. 9
History, Political Science, Jurisprudence, and
Mechanical Engineering 17
Miscellaneous, including General Elective, Engineering Electives, Metallurgy, and Gym-
PRoposED
Course.
13
30
12
Cer
100
The foregoing comparison of the proposed course in industrial engineering with the average of twelve representative courses in mechanical engineering, brings out the following contrasts:
1.—In English and modern languages the proposed course provides for 13 per cent of credits against an average of 9 per cent. Most observers will admit that the engineer who is to become a manager must have a better command of language than has hitherto been the rule with technical graduates.
2.—The group of History, Political Science, Jurisprudence and Accounting, is raised to 30 per cent in the proposed course from an average of 3 per cent in present mechanical-engineering courses. It is believed this heavy increase is justifiable and necessary in order to produce men who can become practical, successful business men, and to reduce the number of business failures, without any weakening of the fundamentals in engineering.
3.—The Mathematics of the proposed course aggregate 12 per cent, identical with the existing average.
4.—The Physics of the proposed course has been reduced to 4 per cent from an average of 7 per cent in existing courses. It is believed that the higher mathematical physics of wave- motion may be omitted in this course.
5.—The Chemistry percentage in the proposed course is 7, as against an average of 6 per cent. The coming business man needs to know more about the composition of the materials with which he is dealing than has hitherto been the case, and chemistry stopping short of quantitative analysis is not sufficient.
6.—-Drawing, including projection, mechanical drawing and descriptive geometry, has been reduced from 5 to 4 per cent. The student, however, has occasion to use his drawing instruments in his subsequent courses in structures and architectural drawing and in kinematics.
7.—The percentage of shop work is reduced to 4 per cent in the proposed course, from an average of 9 per cent. The reason for this is that the institution undertaking to teach engineering should not be a manual-training school. The kind of instruction in shop work that will be of real value to the industrial engineer is of a totally different character from that which has been heretofore given, and it will not require so much time.
I wish to quote briefly from the outline of the course in Principles of Machine Manufacture as scheduled by Columbia University for the coming year.
“The Economic Elements of Shop Processes. Time and power per unit of surface finished or cut, and per unit of metal removed, with the conditions for most economic production. Processes in the shop. Functional operation of engine lathes, turret lathes, and automatic machinery, and limits of economic production by each process. Times of setting, handling, forming and finishing of parts for job and repetitive work in quantity. Limits of time, power, and cost for finishing surfaces per square inch and removing per cubic inch and per pound by hand and machine operations. Machines for performing specific operations, their functional operation, capacities, adaptability and rate of production. * * * * Value of limit gauges, standard and special; measuring devices and methods of inspection. Selection of economic cutting conditions, and analysis of recent experiments on relations between rate of feed, depth of cut, heat treatment, form of tool, quality of the metal being cut, diameter of work, elasticity of work and tool ; time of cut and cooling during cutting on the maximum allowable cutting speed. Adaptation of economic cutting speeds to machine tools as affected by the pulley and feeding power of the machine. Labor saving devices in the pattern shop. Tools and appliances used, capacity and adaptability, * * * * etc.”
8.—Mechanics in the proposed course occupies 7 per cent, the same as the average.
9.—Civil-Engineering branches in the proposed course occupy 5 per cent, as against an average of 4 per cent, the increase being due to emphasis being laid on the graphics of structures in the proposed course.
10.—Architecture occupies 3 per cent in the proposed course, as against an imperceptible percentage in the average, The industrial engineer needs to use better judgment in erecting new plants and plant extensions than has been the rule in the past, and elementary architecture is desirable among the branches to be taught him.
11.—Machine Design in the proposed course has been reduced to 2 per cent from an average of 14 per cent. This is the heaviest cut, and is made for the reason that almost all competent machine designers unite in stating that if a technical graduate is thoroughly grounded in mechanics, kinematics, and strength of materials, and knows how to handle his instruments, his training is sufficient. When the technical graduate goes to work in a drafting room he must learn the special conditions there existing, and a thorough knowledge of the above fundamentals is more essential than much time spent in detailing in his educational course.
12.—Electrical Engineering has 1 per cent in the proposed course, as against an average of 4 per cent. The industrial engineer needs more to know about the selection of the right kind of apparatus and the essentials of direct-current and three-phase alternating-current installations than about the mathematics of alternating currents.
13.—“Mechanical Engineering” in the proposed course fills 8 per cent as against an average of 17 per cent, due to the omission of technical thermodynamics and analytical heat-engine tests,
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