SCOPE (Senior Capstone Program in Engineering)


What is SCOPE?

SCOPE is a unique industry-university collaboration, and the culminating experience of an Olin College student's education. Over the course of a full academic year, seniors work in multi-disciplinary teams to provide innovative solutions to a company’s real-world problems.

At Olin College of Engineering, a fundamental part of our philosophy is that learning occurs through immersion in real-world applications.

We believe that undergraduate students can create value in the world while learning.

 

SCOPE Projects

Explore SCOPE projects by interest area, sponsor and year.

See all SCOPE Projects

Sponsor a SCOPE Team to:

 

Work with a team of differently-trained engineers to look at a problem from a new perspective. 

Student teams provide innovative solutions to industry sponsors’ significant projects.

IP belongs to the sponsoring organization.

Build a presence on campus for recruiting.

SCOPE sponsors have hired many students for internships and full-time employment.

Support Olin's leadership role in the movement to transform engineering education. 

Olin was founded to become an important and constant contributor to the advancement of engineering education in America and throughout the world and, through its graduates, to do good for humankind.

Contact Lauren Palmer to learn more: lpalmer@olin.edu

SCOPE By the Numbers

4-6

Innovative Olin Seniors per Team

1

Academic Year of work--Sept-May

1,000s

Ideas, iterations, faculty advising meetings, aha moments

100%

Sponsor-Owned IP

Kersten Elenteny

We continue to be impressed

by the caliber of students we’ve worked with through the Olin SCOPE program. Not only do they possess critical and creative thinking capabilities, they are polished product managers, eager to take on new challenges outside their comfort zone. Our team learns just as much from them as I believe they learn from us through our projects and incredible partnership.

Kersten Elenteny

Director, Pfizer

Determine if a SCOPE partnership is right for your organization
  • Olin students learn user experience and design thinking skills from day one, along with a heavy measure of self-directed learning, teamwork, and project management experience.

    This approach creates engineering innovators, inventors, entrepreneurs, and leaders who apply the skills they’ve learned over their first three years at Olin to an industry project in SCOPE. 

    SCOPE projects are much deeper endeavors than typical senior capstone projects, and are especially relevant for preparing engineering graduates because sponsors scope out projects that really matter to them.  Teams of approximately five students work to provide innovative solutions to industry sponsors’ significant projects as a full-year September to May course. Each team of students is assembled through the combined efforts of students and faculty to meet the technical challenges of each project. 

     

  • Every engineering manager has a running list of projects that they wish they could get to:

    examining manufacturing challenges, product development and prototyping for new applications, improving user interfaces, product ideation and market exploration, etc.

    These projects are in the category of what we call “Class 2” for an organization - not your critical path projects, but projects that have good potential upside if only you had the time or people available to look into them.  And these are the kinds of projects where our SCOPE teams have had significant impact for many sponsor organizations.

  • We work closely with potential partners to ensure that there is a good culture match between our organizations and skill match for the project. 

    Our advance discussions with sponsors set up SCOPE projects that provide exceptional value to our industry partners while providing an important and exciting educational experience for our students.

    Areas of focus include:

    • Mechanical Engineering

    • Electrical Engineering

    • Computer Engineering

    • Bioengineering

    • Robotics

    • Engineering Design

    • Prototyping

    • Entrepreneurship

    • Human-centered design

    • Sustainable design

  • SCOPE entails a significant commitment…

    From the STUDENT TEAMS: 

    a full academic year course with substantial internal and external deliverables, including weekly progress updates to the sponsor’s liaison, frequent internal reviews of design and engineering work to get feedback from faculty and SMEs, and mid-year and final presentations and reports;

    From the SPONSOR: 

    a sponsorship fee of $60,000, a liaison who is committed to supporting the student team including a weekly call, and access to background information including organizational perspective and technical expertise;

    And from OLIN COLLEGE: 

    a strong structure in place to support the teams; each team has a faculty advisor, subject matter experts, bi-weekly sprint reviews, ongoing workshops to support the students in their project roles, dedicated workspace, budgets to purchase materials, and full use of the machine shop and support, for example.

     

  •  

    Additional Details for Potential Sponsors

    Here you will find information on the timeline for sponsoring a SCOPE project, the benefits of becoming a SCOPE Sponsor and the notable milestones during the Academic Year in which projects are being worked on.


    Ready to start a conversation about SCOPE?

     

    Contact Lauren Palmer

    Associate Director of Partnership Development

    lpalmer@olin.edu

SCOPE Leadership

Academic Director of SCOPE; Adjunct Assistant Professor

Interested in learning more about our academic program?

sbloomer@olin.edu

BIO

Associate Director of Partnership Development

Interested in learning about working with Olin on a SCOPE project?

lpalmer@olin.edu

BIO

SCOPE Program Director

General questions about SCOPE?

jessica.mccarthy @olin.edu

Meet our Teaching Team and Subject Matter Experts

Each SCOPE team has a faculty advisor and access to Subject Matter Experts at Olin.

Bios