Workshop at a company with students from two different disciplines

Teachers from two different disciplines, Materials and manufacturing and Industrial design, are brought together to give a course on masters level. Also the students come from different disciplines. They study two different master programs in Product development, Product development and materials engineering and Industrial design. The course is called Materials and design, and it covers both disciplines. Apart from lectures, computer labs and home assignments, a workshop was arranged where the students during one day solved a task related to product development. The students were divided into groups in such a way that a mixture of students from the two programs was obtained. The workshop was held at a company in order to make the work more realistic. Before they started to solve the task, they were given an introduction to the products made by the company and their applications. The main task was then to investigate the products and come up with ideas about what applications there might be in the future. The result was at the end of the day presented to the company. In this paper, the workshop is described, and comments and reflections from the students and the company are summarized. Finally the teachers involved give their opinion about the result and the pedagogic benefits from such a workshop, and also what to think about for the next time. It appeared that the workshop was an eye-opener to the company at the same time as the students had a fair chance to work in a realistic situation and practice how to use their knowledge. Also for the teachers it was a good experience, not only from a pedagogic viewpoint but also on how to arrange this kind of workshops in the future