The Tshwane University of Technology’s (TUT) Electrical Engineering Department recently undertook a major refurbishment of its electronic engineering laboratory. This involved scrapping the older, outdated instruments and replacing them with Tektronix AFG 1022 arbitrary generators, Tektronix TBS 1052B-EDU digital storage oscilloscopes, and GW Instek DC power supplies. The newly configured laboratory is used by some 450 electronics students for their design projects, with 42 students accommodated per laboratory session.
Head of department Professor Josiah Munda commented: “Our newly equipped laboratory is what any university of technology worth its salt should have. We would like every laboratory at TUT to have access to state-of-the-art equipment for the betterment of students in our country.”
An important component of the success of this model is the enlisting of two undergraduates to mentor and assist Electronics 1, 2 and 3 and design project students during the laboratory classes. “Mentoring and the assistance of students by fellow students during sessions has been found to be the most effective method of teaching in our laboratories,” added Munda.
Undergraduate students Jackson Chokoe and Remmington Seima, in addition to conducting laboratory sessions, also undertake the general maintenance of the laboratory equipment. Seima commented, “With new equipment, everything is so much more advanced and easier to maintain. For example, we are able to monitor every instrument individually while the class works. The big advantage is being able to assist and correct or change settings in real-time.”
Darius Opperman, the Comtest account manager responsible for the supply of the instruments added, “Probably the greatest value of the new equipment to the lecturers is the ability to manage and monitor students individually during sessions. Every instrument can be tracked while the student is performing set tasks. Not to mention the time saving aspect of updating all the firmware to prepare for a specific class. Instead of updating each instrument individually, this can now be done from the server, using Tektronix SmartLAB software.”
Section head, Livhuhani Ntsandeni concluded, “This is far more functional and technically advanced than anything we had previously. The students and lecturers, alike, are most impressed. We have now had two semesters using the new equipment and both students and lecturers are most impressed. The equipment allows us to produce appreciably more relevant engineering training.”
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