Hands-on engineering courses in the COVID-19 pandemic: adapting medical device design for remote learning

The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged the status quo of engineering education, especially in highly interactive, hands-on design classes. Here, we present an example of how we effectively adjusted an intensive hands-on, group project-based engineering course, Medical Device Design & Innovation, to a remote learning curriculum. We first describe the modifications we made. Drawing from student pre and post feedback surveys and our observations, we conclude that our adaptations were overall successful. Our experience may guide educators who are transitioning their engineering design courses to remote learning. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version of this article (10.1007/s13246-020-00967-z) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.