Capstone Projects: An Advertising Opportunity for Universities

Smull College of Engineering Logo

Capstone projects are usually the hardest part of any senior’s final year in college. The projects are assigned to students in hopes of preparing them for industry by practicing the skills that have been hammered into their brains over the course of their four years in courses. The projects may or may not involve the cooperation of interdisciplinary teams in order to further prepare students for work in industry. The Smull College of Engineering at Ohio Northern University is no exception to this pattern. When students reach senior status in this program, they are required to complete a capstone in order to graduate in the spring.  The capstone projects can be obtained through outside clients reaching out to the college, or by student referral. The approved projects by the faculty are then assigned teams of engineers to complete the project from design to actual implementation of a finished product. These projects have the potential to catch the eye of the University as potential advertisement opportunities. The most recent project used for a University advertisement was the construction of three wind turbines at the edge of the campus. This was a cooperative project between the engineering and business colleges in order to push the university’s relatively new green energy initiative.  Once the project was complete, the university from the project’s completion until now in hopes to attract students to commit the university.

The University has since been looking for a new project to use as part of its admissions campaign to attract students. The one currently being focused on is my capstone project. This project is a cooperative project between the engineering and musical theater programs of Ohio Northern. The project involves the designing and building of a computer controlled deck winch system for use in the theater. This system will be used in the place of stagehands to move heavy scenery across the stages of the Freed Center for the Performing Arts at speeds greater than is capable using manual force. It will also ensure the movement is done smoothly and safely in the case that actors may be on top of the moving set pieces. The movement will be created by a mechanical system compos

ing of an electric motor, an emergency brake and a speed reducer will spin a drum that will wind and unwind steel cable to generate force and maintain the desired speed of the movement. The cable will be run under a false floor built atop the stage surface in order to create a track for the piece to follow without risking actors being caught or harmed by the moving cable. The computer aspect of the system will involve an interface for the user to enter their desired values for distance traveled, time it takes to travel and time to speed up and slow the moving scenery. This will then relay the information specified by the user into inputs recognizable to the electrical components controlling the output of the electric motor. The marketing department was made aware of this project in its early stages, and requested to be kept up to date on the progress of the project.

Computer generated mechanical system model

The early stages of the project were not really very exciting in terms of visual components. The beginning stages of the project consisted mainly of calculations in order to size the motor

and the speed reduction needed. However, a computer model of the mechanical portion of the system was generated to communicate the arrangement of the components in the mechanical system. During the second semester, the marketing department became more involved with the progress of the project. The first stage of communication with the university marketing department began with providing the university newspaper with a synapsis of the project to print as well as post on the website as a “teaser” for the completion of the project. A photo shoot was also conducted with the university photographer in order to provide a more step by step progression of the project to be used in the advertisement for the university. The future coordination with the marketing department will consist of visually documenting the testing phase of the project. This will involve installing the system within the Freed Center to test the usability of the system. This will then be used to create a showcase of the project that will ultimately make it into the advertising campaigns for the university.