So how big is eSyst?  Three years ago when the eSyst grant was awarded by the NSF, almost no programs in the United States were system based.  There were a few out there, oasis in the desert, but you could count them on two hands.  When project manager Tom McGlew and the eSyst team of developers proposed the eSyst concept to over 100 electronics teachers at a conference – they were almost laughed out of the room.  “You can’t do that?  We can’t change!  There are no text books for this.  Why change when we have been doing this for thirty years?”  Remember, this was an online curriculum. 

Meeting this much resistance, the eSyst team took a step back and changed their focus.  Instead of changing the whole curriculum, they changed six courses.  These changes were not drastic.  Tweaks, you could say.  Emphasize this more, this less, add this in, take this out, and lo and behold, six courses were completed with labs.  Meanwhile, during the development phase, Tom and the other eSyst developers were at conferences, listening about programs that had low enrollment and were threatened with being shut down.  They kept telling these instructors that the systems approach could help them.  For three years they were a voice crying in the desert.  There were emails on list serves that derided what they were doing.  There was resistance from teachers who have taught the way they have taught for years and did not want change.  Industry said this is great, why aren’t you doing it? 

But through conferences and webinars, the eSyst developers constantly talked about what a systems approach could do.  The developers started changing their own programs to eSyst.  They began to notice that they were having a higher retention rate; that their classes were getting bigger.  Students were enjoying the classes much more than before as were the faculty. 

And a change began to happen.  At a conference in Texas in February, Tom attended a presentation by a producer of training equipment.  One of the slides was a thank you slide to eSyst for the systems concept.  They had heard about eSyst from Tom at a conference the previous summer.  By December they brought in twenty major industry partners and asked them how they wanted technicians to be trained.  “Systems based” was the unanimous voice.  And so the company redesigned their trainer to be systems based. 

In May, one person who was adamantly against changing to the systems approach wrote the list serve again, had changed his position, and was now fully supportive of the systems approach.  A few states (Ohio and California) have recently approved degree/certificate programs in Electronic Systems Technology.  The one in Ohio is ABET approved.  This is not only changing two-year degree programs; institutions like Arizona State University and Massachusetts Institute of Technology are adopting the systems approach to their Electronics Engineering programs.  Take a look at www.cdio.org for more information on system changes to four-year Engineering institutions worldwide.  Other states are in the works. 

From there, it has been picking up steam.  A major technical college calls to say they want eSyst’s help in changing from the old curriculum to a systems based.  Then a major textbook publisher calls to tell us that they are writing a textbook on the systems approach and can we help.  Faculty members are joining eSyst and downloading the material and labs (all free for them thanks to the NSF).  And so we prepare for eSyst 2, which is really going to be like what was originally proposed for eSyst.  Why?  Because now faculty are demanding the original idea.  Who says you can’t change the world?

Mark Viquesney