Abstract:

In Spain, the Degree in Food and Agriculture Engineering and the Rural Environment and the Master’s Degree in Agronomic Engineering allow the access to a regulated professional position. The professional functions and attributes of Agricultural Technical Engineers and Agricultural Engineers are defined through a strict regulatory framework.

Therefore, among others, the Ministerial Orders CIN/323/2009 and CIN/325/2009 establish the requirements of the previous academic programmes through the definition of specific mandatory curricular contents that should ensure the acquisition by students of basic competences for a suitable professional practice.

The professional functions of such engineers cover a wide spectrum in the public and private sectors, and should contribute to the modernisation and technological evolution of agriculture, and food and cattle industry. Project engineering stands out within the broad range of specific activities. In this field, agricultural engineers can take part in the project design, planning and execution. In particular, the ability to design and manage irrigation installations is one of the most specific professional attributes of Agricultural Engineers.

Besides, purely numerical mathematical computing software are very valued tools in all types of engineering branches, because they can be customized for solving a wide spectrum of problems. Therefore, a thorough training in such tools is provided in almost all engineering degree and master degree programs. Usually, a basic software training to solve purely mathematical problems is scheduled for the first course, while a more specific training for technical problem resolution in extra-mathematical contexts is scheduled for the following years. However, this was not the case in the degree programs of agricultural engineering, and different proposals were made to partially offset this lack. These proposals mainly focus on reference evapotranspiration estimation, a key parameter to estimate irrigation doses.

The recent sanitary emergency has led to a new scenario at Spanish universities, where, among others, a great part of academic activities must be performed remotely. The implementation of new methodologies is crucial for ensuring a suitable remote learning.

This paper describes an educational proposal for improving the acquisition of the competences in the Degrees of Agricultural Engineering for performing the design and management of irrigation installations. The proposed activities consist in the implementation of scripts for addressing the design of pressurized irrigation subunits using numerical computing tools.

These activities aim, besides, to consolidate mathematical concepts in non-mathematical-statistical contexts, to promote the use of mathematical software for solving engineering problems, to enhance motivation and understanding by confronting real and specific engineering problems self-sufficiently, and to establish remote collaborative team working between students of different courses and training.

So, in this proposal the students of different subjects corresponding to the Degree in Food and Agriculture Engineering and the Rural Environment and the Master’s Degree in Agronomic Engineering work together to develop a software for the design of irrigation installations splitting the team in groups, where each group faces the implementation of different calculation scenarios.

Keywords:

Remote learning, Agricultural Engineering, Irrigation, Numerical Computing Tools, Octave.