In the past decade, online learning has seen incredible growth, and BYU Online is at the forefront of innovation and progress. As enthusiasm for online learning continues to rise, more online classes are created each year to serve matriculated BYU students, high school students, and adults all over the world.
Not all subject matter, however, has easily made the transition to an online format. Until 2024, no courses from the BYU College of Engineering were offered online. At the beginning of the year, talk began between the College of Engineering faculty and BYU Online. “One element of BYU’s five-year strategic plan is to make use of the benefits of online education,” says Chris Mattson, professor of mechanical engineering. “We’re a strong department, but we weren’t participating in that part of the strategic plan. . . . So, I volunteered to teach my class (ME EN 272: Engineering Graphics) online.”
The decision to finally create an online engineering course was a significant landmark, both for the College of Engineering and for BYU Online. In February, senior instructional designer Joshua Pope of BYU Continuing Education was tasked with developing the online course that would be piloted in the Fall 2024 semester. “It was super exciting to have faculty that saw the possibilities with [online learning],” Pope said.
Though BYU Online had already developed hundreds of successful online courses, tremendous efforts were made to ensure that the first online engineering course would be a success. “We did a lot of exploration with this class to make sure we could pull off the experience that [Professor Mattson] envisioned,” Pope shared. This meant there was a lot of communication and collaboration throughout the process. “We don’t often have an instructor that wants to be super hands on with building their online course, and [Professor Mattson] was. . . . It was a fantastic partnership,” Pope explained.
Despite there being a history of skepticism regarding the effectiveness of online engineering classes, the pilot of the ME EN 272: Engineering Graphics online course exceeded all expectations! After teaching the class online, Professor Mattson said, “Now that I’ve [taught this class online], it’s quite questionable whether certain classes should even have a live lecture.” Not only did Professor Mattson enjoy his experience in teaching the class online, but now multiple professors teaching other courses have expressed interest in online teaching.
While many engineering classes will likely continue to be taught solely in person, the online engineering graphics course’s success suggests a bright future for online learning within the College of Engineering. Professor Mattson commented, “We have two computer-centric classes in our department: the engineering graphics class and a numerical methods class.” For these kinds of classes, he feels that “the learning is a lot better with the online course.”
Though it remains to be seen how many engineering courses can effectively be taught online, the creation and success of the ME EN 272: Engineering Graphics course marks significant progress in the extent of online learning at BYU. BYU CE staff, faculty from the College of Engineering, and participating students agree that the class was a huge success.
Students who took the class said the following:
- “This is the perfect class to take online. All of the work is meant to be done online anyway, so having all of the material a few clicks away is really helpful. Despite not being in the classroom, I am able to talk to the professor in person during his office hours and get great feedback and points back on the assignments.” —Marshall Christensen
- “I love this course online. I can do the work whenever works best for me and don't have to sit through painful lectures. I'd take this over in person any day.” —Gavin Spell
- “Hands down the online version of ME EN 272 has been one of the best classes I've ever had at BYU.” —Daniel Bittner
