Interdisciplinary Undergraduate Opportunities Roy Eckardt College Scholars Program The Roy Eckardt College Scholar Program is intended for students who show outstanding academic promise or unusual creativity and whose interests transcend traditional programs. The program allows undergraduates to devise individualized courses of study and to engage in scholarly work of an advanced nature. With the approval of the program director, participants design their own academic programs. In the final two years, the student receives up to twelve credits for original work with a faculty member, leading to a senior project of substantial dimensions. This can take whatever form (research thesis, design, composition, etc.) is appropriate to the nature of the subject. Students present accounts of their projects at the annual college scholar graduation dinner. 20-30 students annually. Design of Athletic Facilities In an ongoing series of integrated learning experience projects at Lehigh, undergraduate students research and design real athletic facilities and related equipment. Topics vary by term. For example, recently undergraduates from marketing, architecture, industrial engineering, civil engineering and economics divided into several teams to work on the economic, technical, regulatory, aesthetic and social elements of designing a double-field sports complex for soccer, field hockey and lacrosse. Their work included natural turf and astro-turf fields, double-sided seating area, press box, lights, field grading and drainage, traffic flow and budget. The project was featured in Sports Illustrated, Civil Engineering Magazine as well as the New York Times, and the students presented the design to Lehigh’s Board of Trustees. They received approval for a new $2.4 million, 2,000-seat stadium for the university. While students cannot finalize anything that requires a professional license, they did do all of the conceptual work. When Lehigh builds the facility in the near future, its contracts with architects and engineers will stipulate that the student design concepts be retained. 20-30 students annually. Independent Research, Senior Theses and Honors Theses Most departments across campus offer the opportunity for undergraduate majors to pursue an extended original scholarly project in their senior year. Often these qualify the student for senior honors in their major. Independent or thesis research generally entails close one-on-one supervision by a faculty member in the related field and formal oral and written presentations. More than 100 students annually. Integrated Exhibit Design Exhibit design is a chameleon of a discipline made up of art, design, architecture, engineering, psychology, communication, education, ergonomics, history, marketing, computing and theatre arts. Consequently, students with experience in exhibit design can go on to a wide range of professions, including developing theatre sets, trade show booths, museum exhibits, interior designs, graphic designs, wayfinding and signage systems and point of sales displays. Teams of students in the Integrated Exhibit Design course are responsible for developing exhibits to be implemented in collaboration with real clients, such as museums, architects, historical societies and corporations. Course deliverables include background research, concept sketches, oral, written and visual presentations, CAD drawings, virtual and physical prototypes, and in many cases the final real exhibit. 15-25 students participate annually on 4-6 project teams. IPD: Integrated Product Development Program The pioneering Integrated Product Development (IPD) Program is to our knowledge the only undergraduate curriculum in the nation to fully integrate the three fundamental pillars of successful product design and commercialization: design arts, engineering and business. Recently a national winner of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers’ Curriculum Innovation Award, IPD stresses a hands-on approach to prototype and product development. Teams of engineering, business and design arts students produce technical and business feasibility studies, design mock-ups, working prototypes and business plans for real industrial clients. IPD emphasizes a solid grasp of engineering science, industrial design and business fundamentals, good communication skills, a superior understanding of the design and manufacturing process and thorough appreciation of the value of multi-disciplinary teamwork. IPD has been featured in U.S. News and World Report Best Colleges Guide, in the New York Times and on national television. IPD student teams have been invited in each of the last four years to display their inventions at the "March Madness for the Mind" event held annually at the Smithsonian Institute. Roughly 120 juniors and seniors take part each year in 20 to 25 teams. Lehigh CORPS: Community Research and Policy Service Lehigh CORPS is multi-disciplinary, experiential, team-based program in regional and urban economic development. It is operated principally by multi-disciplinary teams of undergraduate students. Lehigh CORPS teams tackle real problems of economic development, planning and policy formulation, working directly on projects in partnership with external client organizations. Because public policy and economic development are inherently multi-disciplinary, Lehigh CORPS teams include students from each of Lehigh’s colleges, integrating their expertise. By nature, economic development planning projects can include students and faculty across a wide range of disciplines: e.g. economics, finance, marketing, law, urban studies, political science, public administration, history, sociology, environmental science, geology, architecture, and civil engineering. Each year 15-25 undergraduates from these and other disciplines participate.