Proceedings of the 2007 Winter Simulation Conference S. G. Henderson, B. Biller, M.-H. Hsieh, J. Shortle, J. D. Tew, and R. R. Barton, eds. WHAT I WISH THEY WOULD HAVE TAUGHT ME (OR THAT I WOULD HAVE BETTER REMEMBERED!) IN SCHOOL Charles R. Standridge Daniel A. Finke Carley Jurishica 301 West Fulton P.O. Box 30 180 Harvester Drive, Suite 190 School of Eng. 136 Kennedy Hall Applied Research Laboratory Burr Ridge, I.L. 60527, U.S.A. Grand Valley State University The Pennsylvania State University Grand Rapids, M.I. 49504, U.S.A. State College, P.A. 16801, U.S.A. David M.Ferrin Catherine M. Harmonosky 1707 East Highland Avenue 310 Leonhard Building FDI Simulation Dept. Of Industrial Engineering Phoenix, A.Z. 85016, U.S.A. The Pennsylvania State University University Park, P.A., 16802, U.S.A. ABSTRACT This panel reflects upon their experiences as simulation professionals and shares their thoughts regarding elements of their simulation education that they have found most helpful in their work as well as things they wish they would have learned. With diverse backgrounds and simu- lation application areas, their perspectives may provide food for thought to simulation course developers and to those in the midst of their educational process. 1 CHARLES R. STANDRIDGE: TEACH STUDENTS TO BE SIMULATION CONSULTANTS Students need to learn how to do realistic simulation pro- jects, that is become simulation consultants. Thus, the simulation methods students need to know depend on the requirements for doing a simulation project in their area of interest. Students must be instructed in these methods as well as given the opportunity to apply them, ideally in an industrial setting. Since this is not always possible, case studies and problems (Richards et. al 1995) that are realistic metaphors for industry based projects can be em- ployed. Using this approach for simulation instruction was first proposed by Shore and Plager (1978). One im- plementation of this approach is discussed in Standridge (2000). This perspective has been used to develop three courses in the Product Design and Manufacturing Engi- neering Program in the School of Engineering at Grand Valley State University as discussed by Standridge (2006). 1. EGR 440 Production Models – A required un- dergraduate course. 2. EGR 640 Production Operations Models – A re- quired graduate course. 3. EGR 642 Facilities Layout and Materials Movement – A required graduate or elective un- dergraduate course with either EGR 440 or EGR 640 as the pre-requisite. As a part of developing these courses, the following methods were considered necessary to performing simula- tion projects in the production and logistics areas: 1. A simulation project process. The process in- cludes requirements definition, modeling build- ing with data collection, experimentation, review of results, and implementation. Emphasis is on the iterative nature of the process. For example, the review of results may result in modification to the models as well as new experiments and further reviews. 2. The importance of and techniques for building credibility with those sponsoring a simulation project. Emphasis is placed on including project sponsors in requirements definition, conceptual model building, verification, validation, and re- view activities in a timely manor. 3. Modeling, both the process world view and the resource graph method of Hyden, Roeder, and Schruben (2001). The latter is important for concurrently modeling the movement of workers and parts in work cells for example. 4. Modeling specific items in the application area of interest. For production operations and logis- tics, these include workstations, finite inter- 2315 1-4244-1306-0/07/$25.00 ©2007 IEEE