Boost Their Game

An engineering virtual internship such as Nephrotex should have five key components: (1) a realistic, compelling, and relevant problem; (2) a multidimensional, complex design space that precludes easy optimization; (3) competing client or stakeholder demands, with no one product able to satisfy all of them; (4) a largely online learning environment, which keeps costs down and allows for the collection of rich data on student learning processes and outcomes; and (5) positive female and other non-majority role models, which helps address the "leaky pipeline" in American engineering degree programs. Furthermore, students showed statistically significant gains in understanding of both general concepts, such as experimental design, and specific concepts, such as strategies to prevent membrane fouling. Since the publication of this paper, we have developed and deployed a second engineeringvirtual internship.