2.3 Mobile Studios
A Mobile Studio is technology-based pedagogy based on inexpensive hardware/software which,
when connected to a PC (via USB), provides functionality similar to that of electronic laboratory
equipment (scope, function generator, power supplies, DMM, etc.) typically associated with an
instrumented studio classroom. The Mobile Studio IOBoard (Figs. 3 and 4) is a small,
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inexpensive hardware platform for use in a home, classroom or remote environment. When
coupled with the Mobile Studio Desktop software, the system duplicates a large amount of the
hardware often used to teach Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering, Physics and K-12
technology-related courses; in addition to a myriad of industrial and commercial utilizations.
In the 1990s, Rensselaer embarked on a large scale effort to develop and implement a new
pedagogical model called Studio. Studio Pedagogy14 was originally developed for 1st and 2nd
year science and math courses15 and then used in essentially all of the core ECE courses. A
typical Studio class meeting begins with a short lecture, demo or hands-on activity to introduce
the key topic or topics of the day. The introduction is followed by paper and pencil calculations,
simulation, and/or experiments, with breaks for discussions and additional lectures as needed.
Lectures could be any length from a few minutes to over an hour, with most around 20 minutes.
The majority of all class time is dedicated to student-focused activities with instructors and other
course staff generally working as a ‘guide on the side’ rather than a ‘sage on the stage,’ which
was an expression heard constantly at the time. Studio was found to be a very good way to
deliver engineering education and attracted a steady stream of visitors to the new classrooms
built specifically for this purpose. Nearly all visitors went away hoping they could implement
something similar. However, very few were successful because the costs were so high. The
facilities necessary to provide lectures, paper and pencil problem solving, numerical simulation
and traditional experiments all in the same room cost about $10k per seat. The investment in
these remarkable rooms required elaborate security systems and placed a hard limit on the
number of students that could be accommodated in an individual section. The learning and
teaching environment was amazing, but implementation logistics were problematic.
At the end of the 1990s, Don Millard and his colleagues developed a vision for a new,
inexpensive studio for teaching electronics based on replacing the very expensive standard set of
instruments found on a typical lab16. When no commercially available product was found, he led
an effort to design and build a small board that could duplicate the needed functionality. With the
help of Analog Devices and ADI Fellow Doug Mercer, RPI student Jason Coutermarsh, funding
from NSF and Hewlett-Packard, and the help and support of a growing, but small number of true
believers from RPI, Howard, and Rose-Hulman, he went through several designs, with varying
degrees of success, until what is called the RED2 board became generally available in 2008.
Earlier designs (including RED and BLUE) showed that the educational vision could be realized,
but were, as a colleague at Rose-Hulman has said, not quite ready for prime time. The RED2
board had all the necessary functionality required and the robust design to survive regular usage
by undergrads. The cost of each was about the same as a textbook or about $150.
The RED2 board has two analog input channels (i.e. scope or DMM inputs), two arbitrary
waveform outputs (i.e. function generator outputs) and D.C. voltages supplies (±4V. The
hardware package also incorporates 16 digital I/O channels, 2 PWM outputs, digital GND and
analog outputs to drive earphones or speakers so both analog and digital electronics can be
addressed. The Mobile Studio Desktop software provides access to scope, function generator,
spectrum analyzer, arbitrary waveform generator, analog input (i.e. DMM), and audio output
functionalities. The hardware can also work with programs written in a very wide variety of
languages such as LabView, Matlab, C, C#, and Python. For example, an extensive set of
LabView executables come with the Desktop package when it is downloaded. Sample programs
written in other languages are available from the Mobile Studio Project website, including a data
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logger program written in C# that samples analog signals every minute or so for an almost
indefinite amount of time17.