Through this project, there were many steps we had to take to bring our desk into fruition. Starting from the research to the final presentation, each part played an important role in making our final design.
Starting off, we were skeptical of how much research would be present on a topic as specific as school desk. We had trouble finding information online and in the MTSU library on the design of a school desk, but as we expanded our search, we found resources on posture, the dangers of sitting, and other areas beneficial to us. We found the key of researching was to look close, but do not look too close that nothing is there. Even still, we had a fair amount of sources, but we could have used more. Our one major flaw that we had with our research is that we did not have enough sources. It is fine to have some that agree with the idea, but only a multitude of sources will be able to provide truth.
We believe our design to be efficient and fixed most of the problems that we have researched such as imperfect posture and adjustability for all body types. The process to get to this point in our design was difficult because of mass production considerations and implementation into an actual high school classroom. However, we’re proud that the design was approved by many students at Central during the Engineering Thesis Convention and that they became excited that there is a prevailing solution to an underlying problem.
Building was one of the easier parts of our project, mainly because we had previous work to give our prototype a foundation. One of the things that made the process a lot easier was our decision to build our prototype off the base of a current school desk and then add improvements to it, which cut out a lot of the over-designing that would be required when we already had a working structure. It also made our final product easier to build, since we just took the same designs a current school desk had to make the structure of the desk, then added our ergonomic and adjustability changes. If we had to do it differently, I would’ve started the building sooner so we didn’t have as much stress in the later stages; we built it across three weekends for a few hours a day, and if we had started earlier it might have been easier to refine and rework the final design.
Testing was particularly difficult because the desk is a consumer based product. Therefore, we needed to make sure that the product satisfied the customers needs and wants while solving the problems that we identified in our research. First, we stress tested it and this was particularly important because the desk needs to be able to handle years of usage. Afterwards, we were fortunate to test it in a classroom which proved to be particularly useful to troubleshoot problems such as an imbalance in the structure itself.
Starting off, we were skeptical of how much research would be present on a topic as specific as school desk. We had trouble finding information online and in the MTSU library on the design of a school desk, but as we expanded our search, we found resources on posture, the dangers of sitting, and other areas beneficial to us. We found the key of researching was to look close, but do not look too close that nothing is there. Even still, we had a fair amount of sources, but we could have used more. Our one major flaw that we had with our research is that we did not have enough sources. It is fine to have some that agree with the idea, but only a multitude of sources will be able to provide truth.
We believe our design to be efficient and fixed most of the problems that we have researched such as imperfect posture and adjustability for all body types. The process to get to this point in our design was difficult because of mass production considerations and implementation into an actual high school classroom. However, we’re proud that the design was approved by many students at Central during the Engineering Thesis Convention and that they became excited that there is a prevailing solution to an underlying problem.
Building was one of the easier parts of our project, mainly because we had previous work to give our prototype a foundation. One of the things that made the process a lot easier was our decision to build our prototype off the base of a current school desk and then add improvements to it, which cut out a lot of the over-designing that would be required when we already had a working structure. It also made our final product easier to build, since we just took the same designs a current school desk had to make the structure of the desk, then added our ergonomic and adjustability changes. If we had to do it differently, I would’ve started the building sooner so we didn’t have as much stress in the later stages; we built it across three weekends for a few hours a day, and if we had started earlier it might have been easier to refine and rework the final design.
Testing was particularly difficult because the desk is a consumer based product. Therefore, we needed to make sure that the product satisfied the customers needs and wants while solving the problems that we identified in our research. First, we stress tested it and this was particularly important because the desk needs to be able to handle years of usage. Afterwards, we were fortunate to test it in a classroom which proved to be particularly useful to troubleshoot problems such as an imbalance in the structure itself.