Systematic Infusion of Creativity in Engineering Design Courses

Earlier studies have shown that the level of creativity of the fourth year students of the Mechanical Engineering and Manufacturing Engineering Programmes at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia are low to average, as reflected in the evaluation of their group based design projects. Based on the finding for the next cohort of students, several creativity techniques are introduced in the course such as mind mapping and combined with the conventional techniques in design engineering which includes Morphology analysis and Pugh Evaluation matrix. Students are required to apply the techniques and report the implementation in their log books. It was observed that the students are more creative and able to propose ideas that are ‘out of box thinking’. These achievements showed that the creativity level can be enhanced through teaching and learning. In order to ensure an effective infusion of creativity among students in the Mechanical Engineering and Manufacturing Engineering Programmes, it is proposed that the students are exposed to effective creativity techniques combined with the standard engineering design methods for generating ideas. Students should be introduced to the creative techniques through design-based courses from their first year at the university.