[Themaintainers] readings for a 100-level course on maintenance?

[Melinda Hodkiewicz]

Hi Andy
I am rereading Zen and the Art of Motor Cycle Maintenance. It is such a classic and even more impactful the 2nd time around (I was working in operations as a young engineer in the late 1980s when I first read it). I am pulling out some parts which I feel are particularly insightful and am happy to share them with you. Actually it was Lee Vinsel who got me started on this by asking "what book most influenced you". 
Melinda


-----Original Message-----
From: themaintainers-bounces at lists.stevens.edu [mailto:themaintainers-bounces at lists.stevens.edu] On Behalf Of Andrew Russell
Sent: Monday, 20 November 2017 1:15 AM
To: themaintainers at lists.stevens.edu
Subject: [Themaintainers] readings for a 100-level course on maintenance?

Hi everyone - 

Help!

In Spring 18 I’ll be teaching a 100-level course on Science, Technology, and Human Values, offered by my college's program in Interdisciplinary Studies.  We treat the course as a special topics course: in past semesters faculty have focused on themes of food & public health, but in Spring 18 I’m organizing the course around innovation and maintenance.  I’ll have no more than 24 students, maybe as few as a dozen, and I expect that all will be taking it because it satisfies a general education humanities requirement.  I’m guessing a good chunk of the students will be computer science majors. A small but significant detail is that courses on my campus are 4 credits, which means class runs twice weekly for 1 hour & 50 minutes.

My questions for you all have to do with readings, assignments, projects, and so on.  I’ve got some ideas, but I’m hoping you can help me with a few things.  My provisional semester outline starts by tracing some history of “innovation”; then turn to readings on maintenance (drawing heavily from the Maintainers conference papers); perhaps assign the book “Shop Class as Soulcraft”; and spend significant time on group projects that will be ethnographies of maintenance (inspired by Henke’s “Mechanics of Workplace Order").

Questions: 

First, have you or anyone you know taught a course with these themes?  Clearly there are many STHV syllabi out there, and those are helpful, but it’s the innovation/maintenance angle where I need the most help.  I know there is a genre of “innovation studies” courses that I plan to explore, although I don’t have high expectations (to be honest).  I’d be curious to see syllabi recommended by this group.

Second, do you have any readings/materials (books, essays, movies, etc) that you would recommend?  In some ways I think a 100-level non-majors course could be trickier than a advanced undergrad seminar or graduate course, and I want to make sure the readings are engaging and the projects are meaningful.  Rigor is important, of course, but I’m not overly concerned with teaching theory or methods in any particular field.  

I’ll be really happy to hear any suggestions, and I’ll share the syllabus once I’ve got it nailed down…

Thanks!

Andy
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