Facilities
In addition to the technical resources provided to all Shippensburg University students, there are a number of items only available to students in the School of Engineering (SoE). The following provides an overview of our current resources. The majority of our labs are equipped with a keypad door lock to make the equipment accessible to students outside of class. (See FAQ #14) Please note that access to these resources is a privilege which can be revoked if students are found violating defined usage policies and guidelines.
To meet the needs of our programs, the SoE utilizes a separate infrastructure from the rest of the campus. This provides a flexible and robust environment where our students can develop their skills.
High Performance Computing Lab (MCT158):
Our high performance lab is home to some of the most powerful desktop machines on campus. This is typically used for classes which require powerful workstations such as Advanced Graphics, Compiler Design, and Reconfigurable Computing. Due to its size, it is also used for our larger classes, such as the Modelling and Simulation class (ENGR110), a required course for all Computer, Electrical, Mechanical, and Civil Engineering students.
Software Engineering Lab (MCT162):
Our Software Engineering lab is a re-configurable room design to support team programming and agile development. This is typically used for classes such as Design Patterns, Software Metrics and Extreme Programming. This lab is also the most popular room for the meetings of student groups such as the Programming Team and the Game Dev Club.
Computer & Electrical Engineering Research Lab (MCT163):
Our research lab houses the various tools used by our Computer Engineering and Electrical Engineering programs. This is where we house the School of Engineering equipment for populating, diagnosing, and repairing custom circuit boards. In addition, there are 10 development and test stations for programming, analyzing, and debugging both custom and off-the-shelf embedded boards. It is also home to our advanced 3D printers used for rapid prototyping of board enclosures, sensor housings, and more.
Engineering Graphics Lab (MCT164):
Our Engineering Graphics lab is primarily configured to meet the needs of the Civil and Mechanical engineering programs. This lab contains 12 high end graphics stations equipped with 40″ 4K displays, dedicated graphics, and 3-D Mice. This lab is where one would find the Solidworks, Bentley and AutoCAD Civil3D software suites.
Tutoring & Student Lounge (MCT165):
Our tutoring & study lab provides students in our programs a place where they can access machines with the same configuration as our other labs in order to work on their coursework. In addition to a study area, this area is the overflow space for the Computer & Electrical Engineering Research & Fabrication Lab and is where one would find component storage and the wireless networking tools.
General Purpose Computer Lab (MCT263):
Our general use computing lab is styled as a traditional hands-on computer lab when high performance isn’t necessary. The computers in this lab are configured using the standard SoE Linux image. This lab is typically used for classes such as Python Programming, Computer Science I and II, Overview of Computer Science and more. A few of the machines have increased storage to support the standard dual-boot image to allow for small upper division classes which require Windows-only software tools.
LIVING LEARNING LAB (LCK1L2):
In Lackhove, student housing has established a living & learning area for students enrolled in our programs. This area is a 24 hour study lab reserved solely for the use of the residents of the School of Engineering’s Living & Learning Community. In addition to white boards, there are currently four machines with the standard Linux configuration used in our computer labs.
In order to provide as consistent an environment as possible across all of our resources, we utilize a few standard base configurations for all of our workstations. There is a standard image for Linux and a standard image for Windows. The computers located in the high performance lab, the software engineering lab and the tutoring space are configured as dual boot machines in order to support as many School of Engineering courses as possible.
Many of the courses in our program require special software and/or hardware that your typical student doesn’t have. To help facilitate the learning of the latest technologies, the department provides memberships to academic partner programs such as Microsoft’s Azure for Education, formerly know as Dreamspark. In addition, most of the specialty software used in our labs is available to our students to download, including: Solidworks, JetBrains IDEs, MATLAB, Xilinx, Autodesk products, and OrCAD.