Virtual Pre-Labs for Hydraulics Laboratory

Hydraulics Laboratory is a required course for all civil engineering students at Sacramento State that examines six hydraulic phenomena via six experiments. Because of time and equipment constraints, each student’s hands-on experience is limited, likely contributing to the 6% repeating grade rate for the course (in AY 2014-15). The course redesign will add virtual “pre-labs” based on computational simulations of the physical phenomena covered in the course. These “pre-labs” will allow every student to perform extensive manipulations of the conditions affecting the hydraulic phenomena under study and are expected to increase student engagement and learning.