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Mechanical Engineering

Career and Academic Paths | Academic Advising | Admissions Requirements | Gateway Criteria | Admissions Requirements | Program Regulations | General Education Program | Major Program | Combined B.S./M.S. Program | Special Opportunities | Student Organizations |

Faculty

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Chair

Panos Charalambides

Professors

Muniswamappa Anjanappa
Shlomo Carmi
Akhtar S. Khan
Uri Tasch
Tim Topoleski
Weidong Zhu

Associate Professors

Dwayne Arola
Charles Eggleton
Tony Farquhar
Liang Zhu

Assistant Professors

Dawn Bennett
Ronghui Ma
Anne Spence
Hai-jun Su
Marc Zupan

Associate Professor Emeritus

Christian von Kerczek

Courses in this program are listed under ENME.

Mechanical engineering focuses on the design and production of energy-producing systems and on mechanical devices or mechanisms. These systems and mechanisms are applied to fields ranging from biology, such as artificial hearts, to transport systems, such as cars and airplanes, and in manufacturing tools and plants. The mechanical engineering curriculum at UMBC, accredited by the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET), provides students thorough training in mathematics, physical sciences, engineering sciences and engineering design. Mechanical engineering students also gain a broad education by completing a cross section of courses in the arts and humanities, social sciences, and language and culture in accordance with university General Foundation Requirements (GFR).

The ABET educational objectives of the undergraduate program in mechanical
engineering are:

1) Our graduates will possess the technical skills and knowledge necessary to practice mechanical engineering successfully.

2) Our graduates will be able to pursue graduate and/or professional education in mechanical engineering.

There are several ways for students to progress through the mechanical engineering program. A traditional four-year timetable (outlined below) provides the quickest path to completing the degree. Many students combine their mechanical engineering program with part-time work or community service. UMBC’s Shriver Center helps students develop various ways to accomplish their goals.

Students may opt for part-time employment or internships. The Shriver Center also works with students to develop service internships outside of mechanical engineering, such as tutoring disadvantaged children.

The mechanical engineering department works closely with the Shriver Center to enable students to accomplish both their mechanical engineering education, as well as their service and experience objectives.
It is also possible and quite desirable to combine a mechanical engineering major with a second major, such as mathematics, physics, geography or various other fields. The undergraduate advisor in mechanical engineering helps students to arrange their course work to achieve such educational goals.

Career and Academic Paths

Recent graduates of UMBC’s mechanical engineering program have secured starting engineering positions in both large and small firms, as well as in government laboratories. Some large firms that employ UMBC graduates are BGE, Northrop Grumman Corporation, Black & Decker, Ford Motor Co. and Toyota of North America. Other graduates have secured professional positions in government laboratories, including the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the Naval Surface Weapons Center, the U.S. Army Aberdeen Proving Ground and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center. The heating, ventilation and air conditioning industry is also a large employer of mechanical engineers. Many UMBC mechanical engineering graduates are pursuing both M.S. and Ph.D. degrees at major universities such as The Johns Hopkins University; University of California, Berkeley, Stanford University, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Michigan State University, University of Cincinnati; University of Maryland, College Park; as well as UMBC. Many graduates working in nearby industries pursue part-time graduate work in mechanical engineering or engineering management at UMBC.

Academic Advising

Mechanical engineering students obtain academic advising in two stages. Students at the freshman and sophomore level (determined by the level of engineering courses taken and passed, not by the total number of credit hours taken) are advised by the Undergraduate Student Services in the College of Engineering and Information Technology.

When a student advances to the junior level, a mechanical engineering faculty member is assigned as a permanent advisor who takes over the formal academic advising. Students must meet with their faculty advisor at least once per semester to prepare pre-registration requirements for the following semester. At this time, the faculty advisor helps the student review his or her academic status and plan for an efficient continuation of the student’s program.

The overall advising activity is supervised by the mechanical engineering undergraduate coordinator. The coordinator also grants all special permits that allow students to deviate from normal procedures.

Such permits are required for acceptance of transfer credits for engineering courses, permits to take courses at University of Maryland, College Park and many other items. The undergraduate coordinator or department chair has the final authority in granting such permits.

Admissions Requirements

Applicants who meet the admission requirements to the university and are prepared, by virtue of their high school background and placement tests, to enroll in ENGL 100, MATH 151, ENES 101 and CHEM 101 may designate mechanical engineering as

their intended major. Students are admitted to mechanical engineering when they have passed all four of these courses with a minimum grade of “C” and an overall GPA of 2.5 or higher for all four courses. Students are not allowed to take any other engineering courses until this requirement is fulfilled.

Transfer students will be admitted into mechanical engineering upon completion of 28transferable credit hours with a minimum GPA of 2.5 in the core courses equivalent to ENGL 100, ENES 101, MATH 151, CHEM 101 and all physics, chemistry, mathematics and engineering courses that are included for transfer credit.

Gateway Criteria

The faculty of mechanical engineering have unanimously voted to revise the gateway criteria for newly admitted students into the undergraduate program. The statement below reflects the revised criteria. It is expected that after the consideration and approval by the UMBC undergraduate council and faculty senate, the revised criteria will go into effect at the start of fall 2008 semester. As such, all students applying for admission to UMBC with the intend to pursue studies in mechanical engineering, starting during fall 2008, will have to satisfy the new gateway criteria listed below.

Admissions Requirements

Applicants who meet the
admission requirements to the university and are prepared, by virtue of their high school background and placement tests, to enroll in first or second semester mechanical engineering curriculum courses, may designate mechanical engineering as their intended major. However, students are admitted to mechanical engineering only when they pass the following four courses, CHEM 101, MATH 152, ENME 110 and ENME 220 with a minimum of three “B” and one “C” grades. Students are not allowed to take any other mechanical engineering courses until the gateway requirement is fulfilled.

Transfer students will be admitted into mechanical engineering under the general UMBC transfer admission requirements for students transferring into engineering. In addition, mechanical engineering program requirements require transfer students to have completed the gateway courses (CHEM 101, MATH 152, ENME 110 and ENME 220) or their equivalent transferred courses with a minimum of three “B” and one “C” grades along with the requirement that they receive a grade of “B” or better in their first three ENME courses taken at UMBC which may include ENME 110 and ENME 220.

Past experience has shown that for students to pursue an engineering education successfully immediately upon graduation from high school, they should have taken three years of high school mathematics, including algebra, geometry and trigonometry; one year of physics; and one year of chemistry. Students also should have obtained an SAT score of 1200, with a minimum of 600 on the quantitative test.

Program Regulations


1. The mechanical engineering department publishes the Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Handbook, which details the regulations, policies and opportunities in
the department. The responsibility for proper
registration and for satisfying stated pre-requisites for any course must rest with the student, as does the responsibility for proper achievement in courses in which the student is enrolled. Each student is responsible for being thoroughly familiar with the provisions of the University Undergraduate Catalog and Handbook, including all the academic regulations.

2. Required courses in mathematics, physics and chemistry have highest priority, and it is strongly recommended that every engineering student registers for mathematics, chemistry and physics each semester until he or she has satisfied these requirements.

3. To be eligible for a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering, a student must have an overall average of a least a “C” (2.0) and a grade of “C” or better in all courses. Responsibility for knowing and meeting all degree requirements for graduation in any curriculum rests with the student.

4. To earn a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from UMBC, a minimum of 24 credits of ENME courses must be taken and passed, each with a minimum grade of “C” at UMBC.

General Education Program

Engineering students graduating from UMBC must satisfy 28 credits of General Education Program. The distribution of these 28 credits among arts and humanities, social sciences, and language and culture courses, are enumerated in the Undergraduate Catalog. In addition to these regulations, as part of their 28 GEP credits, mechanical engineering students are required to have at least one course in the arts and humanities sequence and one course in the social sciences sequence at the 200 level or above. Furthermore, one course in the arts and humanities sequence must be PHIL 251: Ethical Issues in Science, Engineering and Information Technology.

Major Program

The freshman year in engineering is designed to lay a strong foundation in mathematics, physical sciences and the engineering sciences upon which the student later will develop a professional program during the sophomore, junior and senior years.

Students applying for admission to UMBC should take the mathematics placement test early enough so, if necessary, MATH 150: Pre-calculus Mathematics could be taken in the summer preceding the first regular semester. The placement test is administered by the Learning Resources Center, and students should make arrangements with them for the test. The test measures the student’s preparation for MATH 151: Calculus and Analytic Geometry.

Students who are not prepared to schedule MATH 151 are advised to schedule MATH 150 in the summer session before the fall (first) semester. At the beginning of the sophomore year, the student selects a primary field of
engineering specialty. At UMBC, courses through the senior year are available
in chemical and mechanical
engineering and computer
engineering.

The science elective can be selected from any course,
at the 300 level or higher, in biology, computer science,
mathematics, physics, chemistry or any engineering field except mechanical engineering. Under certain circumstances, a science course at the 200 level may be used as this elective.

Written approval must be obtained from the undergraduate coordinator before taking the science course toward the degree requirements. A mechanical engineering elective at the 400 level or above may be substituted for the science elective. The other technical electives must be 400-level
mechanical engineering courses, one of which must be a design course.

Combined B.S./M.S. Program

This combined program is designed for completion in five years. Students are encouraged to plan on such an effort from the start. See the Mechanical Engineering Undergraduate Handbook for more information.

Special Opportunities

The mechanical engineering faculty strives to make research opportunities available to undergraduate students at any level. Many students are involved in research projects with faculty advisors. Such activities are particularly valuable and effective for students who aim to pursue their bachelor’s and master’s degrees in the combined B.S./M.S. program offered by the department.

Student Organizations

The mechanical engineering department offers various extracurricular activities to enhance students’ professional development. Students may participate in student chapters of major professional organizations such as the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME); the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE); the American Society of Heating, Refrigeration and Air Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE); the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE); the Society of Women Engineers (SWE) and the Society for the Advancement of Material and Process in Engineering (SAMPE). There is also a chapter of Tau Beta Pi, the national engineering honor society. Other notable activities include technical competitive activities such as the Mini-Baja all-terrain vehicle competition and the Solar Splash solar-powered boat race. There is also an Executive Club of undergraduate students which addresses entrepreneurship and innovation.