Section J
DOCUMENTATION OF EXTERNAL EVALUATION
While our project was heavily evaluated by judges and various consumers at the final engineering presentation, the team received evaluation and feedback throughout the entire design process for the solution.
Lieutenant Taylor & Culp:
One of the the first examples of evaluation the team got was from Sergeant Culp and Lieutenant Taylor. When the analysis of Section A indicated that there were many fundamental issues with body armor, the team interviewed them by asking questions about the various problems of body armor. With their help, more specific and personal information was garnered about these problems. Using those pieces of information, the team created a criteria list that was then evaluated by Sergeant Culp and Lieutenant Taylor. After this, Sergeant Culp was the primary person that evaluated the team’s prototypes, designs, and was the primary participant in the project testing.
Officer Survey:
Because Sergeant Culp and Lieutenant Taylor expressed some conflicting opinions with the second interview between them, the team needed to create a survey to find the overall consensus of officers. Two officers, no matter how qualified, do not create a statistically significant sample size. The team created a survey with the feedback from an English teacher at our school and Sergeant Culp and then sent it out to various police officers in the Franklin and Murfreesboro Police Departments.
Mrs. Murphy:
Mrs. Murphy is an engineering teacher at our school who is also a seamstress. When the team determined it was necessary to have the vest professionally sewn, she received our design and recommended minor changes to the design to either make it easier to sew or to create a better design. When the team requested additional features to the design, she would then help to improve those ideas and the execution of them. For example, when the velcro straps were sewn together with a patch in the middle, she demonstrated how that idea could be made more aesthetically pleasing.
Dr. Van Patten:
Dr. Van Patten is the head of the chemistry department at MTSU. He gave the team (minus Garrett) crucial evaluation and feedback on how to make the STF. The process that was used to make the silica nanoparticles was vague in several aspects, and he would help to fill those gaps in. Also, he would give the team (minus Garrett) advice on how to “industrialize” the process. Crucial equipment that saved hours of time were recommended by him.
Examples from judges and various “consumers”:
The feedback that we received from the judges and other people at the expo was largely positive. The appearance of the carrier with our presentation format brought many people to our presentation. Some of the highlights from everyone at the expo was about the quality of the carrier, the unique triple segment design, the shear thickening fluid, and the testing methods used.
Quad A Presenters:
One of the team members of the project went to a Quad A expo and talked to two people about body armor and some vague details about the design. The team member tried to be vague about our project, as to avoid giving any of our ideas to a larger company. The first person, who was from the military, was very positive about what the project goals were. He provided an additional layer of credibility to our design justifications by even further confirming that body armor had fundamental problems. The other person, who was the head member of the R&D department at Point Blank. He was extremely critical about our ideas and the project, as whenever the team member brought up an aspect of our project, he immediately dismissed that idea and then spoke about how a product of Point Blank’s executed that idea equivalently or better than the team did. For example, when the team member brought up that the team used a STF in the test panels, he immediately said that the team shouldn’t do it and the technology was not there. This is despite the vast amounts of research that indicate that a STF is viable in Kevlar Panels. He did admit that out of a 6 million dollar research budget, he only spent about 30 dollars on the idea of STFs, which seemed odd to place such a concrete opinion on a idea that he barely scratched the surface of.
Positive Feedback:
Overall, people were impressed with how much effort was put into the project. This was especially apparent during the presentation as people would often state things like how the sewing was good or were impressed with the execution of the project. The judges’ responses were positive, as the project’s evaluation scores consisted of a 100, 99, and a 94. Also, as the team tackled various problems and went down the right path, the team received positive feedback from the mentors, which ultimately led up to the expo.
Concerns:
During the presentation, the team did not receive a ton of concerns or negative feedback. The team believes that this is the result of several factors, such as using people experienced in the fields of the project and addressing their concerns, opening up to some of the flaws in our project, and the complicated nature of the project. To get to this point though, the team had to address the concerns of police officers. For each section, the team thought of ideas on how to accomplish the task, gained feedback on those ideas, made sure those ideas were solid, and then implemented them. A confidence in that what the team was doing was correct and valid was essential for the team to accomplish each task. Despite this, there are still concerns about our vest. One is that the vest has a tendency to cover the handcuffs and other vital equipment. The problem could be addressed by either redesigning the bottom panels or by putting the equipment onto the vest itself.