This is the required first year Rodman engineering course. Professor Elzey definitely lives up to the hype. He is extremely insightful and does his best to make the class the best experience for his students. The class is composed of several projects, which helped introduce the engineering design methodologies. While some of the projects caused a little bit of stress due to group procrastination, they ended up being very good learning experiences. Prof. Elzey is a big fan of interdisciplinary learning as well as studying abroad and we definitely learned a lot about all the great opportunities that exist at UVA in those realms. Overall definitely worthwhile!

This class was interesting, engaging, and Elzey is a brilliant professor. One of my favorite classes at UVA.

Great, great class. You really learn a lot about your engineering skills and how to work in a group. Your fellow Rodmans are great people and you really should cherish this class because Elzey makes it so that the class is quite autonomous. I'm not gonna lie the group projects take quite a while- mainly because Elzey does not give you a rubric so you are in a constant struggle to beat out all the other groups in quality and quantity. Nevertheless, the class is great and not hard at all if you work decently hard. The Portfolio is a nice touch, but like other comments have stated, do not wait until the last minute. The Portfolio can be about literally anything- just something that you think is interesting. My only complaint about this class is that the projects tend to be focused on Material Science (Elzey's specialty) and Mechanical Engineering, but I guess first year undergraduates don't have much other knowledge to do projects in other fields of engineering.

When you have a group project to work on, this class takes up a lot of your time. But when you don't have a group project, there's basically no work for you to do from this class. Elzey is very knowledgeable - he lectures in class sometimes, but a lot of class time is devoted to you working on your group projects. Even though these projects are very time-consuming, they're pretty fun, and you definitely learn a lot! Lots of Rodman bonding goes on through these projects as everyone is slaving together. One recommendation: START YOUR ENGINEERING LOGBOOKS EARLY. Just do. You don't want to be up all day and night writing them right before they're due.

Amazing class, you'll do a lot of work but learn a lot, even though there aren't a lot of lectures. Work hard on the projects (group and individual) and you'll get an A

Awesome class to get to know your fellow Rodmans. Elzey is a super-cool guy, too. This class alternates between being super easy and incredibly time consuming, depending on whether you have a project due that week. Also, don't start on the EDP too early. The amount of bonding you will have pulling all-nighters writing that thin with other Rodmans is near that experienced by soldiers in a foxhole.

So much group work and Rodman bonding. Class is not every structured, very few lectures and more listening to other students present their projects. I learned much more outside of class. EDP was a pain, but it was nice to think about all that I learned from the semester after I got over the all-nighter!

This is a requirement for Rodman Scholars so you can't skip this even I told you it was boring. But fortunately it isn't! Professor Elzey is realy interesting and the projects you do during the course are realy helpful in training the problem solving skills.

His class isn't much of a course as an activity; the greatest part of this course is the projects. They take a lot of effort, but are fun and pretty rewarding with the right people! Word of advice: start your freaking EDP's early. You'll know what I mean soon enough.

Required for Rodmans. Mr. Dana Elzey is a great professor, great guy and very knowledgeable. But the class material is dry, and frankly ENGR141R and ENGR142R should have been combined into a single class.