Senior Design Capstone

Collaboration with Georgia Tech Research Scientist and Instructor Dr. Michael Rodgers

The Senior Design Capstone course provides senior CEE students with hands-on engineering experience.  

The structure of the Senior Capstone Design course is based on the formation and operation of student “companies” of four or five students that function as consulting engineers to selected sponsors and undertake a particular design project for that sponsor. The course culminates in a final written report and oral presentation.

Projects are selected by the student companies based on the results an initial evaluation of a “Statement of Qualifications” (SOQ) prepared by the student company in response to an actual active “Request for Qualifications” (RFQ) solicitation from a cooperating sponsor. These SOQ are evaluated by the cooperating sponsor, by the class instructors, and by a cooperating engineering firm that volunteers to participate in this process. The final ordinal ranking of these SOQ from all of the evaluators provides the order in which student companies are allowed to select their final design projects. All projects are actual projects of interest to the participating sponsors. These sponsors agree to provide professional engineering and/or architectural support for the student efforts either from their own staff or from consulting engineers under contract to the sponsor as a condition of participation.

After a project is selected by a student company, the company must meet with their individual sponsors and negotiate the exact scope of the projects and a list of deliverables mutually acceptable to the student company and the sponsor. At the end of the semester, each student group is required to present the sponsor with a final written report and to make a final oral presentation at the sponsor’s facility. 

If you are interested in becoming a project sponsor, please contact Dr. Watkins or Dr. Rodgers.  The students and faculty would like to thank previous Senior Design sponsors, including the following:

• The LPA Group, Inc.
• CH2M Hill
• PBS&J
• Kimley–Horn and Associates
• Jordan, Jones and Goulding/Jacobs Engineering
• CroyEngineering
• Moreland, Altobelliand Associates
• Travis Pruitt and Associates
• Tyler-Scott and Associates
• MantechInternational
• Moffattand Nichol
• Bechtel, Inc.