Engaging distance education students in online graduate level courses in acoustics, noise and vibration

摘要

For more than 25 years, the Graduate Program in Acoustics at Penn State has been offering courses leading to the M.Eng. degree in Acoustics to students at a distance. While methods of course delivery have changed during that time span, the intent and purpose has remained constant: to provide a rigorous and comprehensive acoustics curriculum available to a wide variety of students from different backgrounds and locations. In this paper we provide a brief overview of the M.Eng. in Acoustics Distance Education program along with our current delivery methods. We also summarize the topical content and professor-student interactions for three specific courses: Noise Control Engineering, Computational Acoustics, and Research and Writing for Acousticians. The focus of the paper will be the challenges of engaging distance education students in an online graduate level course in acoustics.