Nowadays global collaborative environments in the corporate world require engineers with professional global competences. In response to such need, different active-learning initiatives have been introduced in academia to prepare engineering students with the necessary knowledge, skills and attitude to be competitive in the global market. Consequently, multinational design projects have been used by the authors as means of introducing professional global skills to engineering students while exposing them to a project-based learning experience. This educational activity faces many challenges including cultural and academic background differences, language and time zone barriers, and issues with communication tools among others. Therefore, this activity is expected to motivate students so they can start developing the professional skills that will help them to overcome difficulties and to carry out the project successfully. This work studies the motivation of students before and after participating in a multinational design project and makes a comparison of this parameter's results based on the effect of gender. To accomplish this objective, the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI) was adapted to the multinational experience and administered to the participating students. For this study, three motivation constructs are taken into consideration: (a) interest/enjoyment, (b) perception of choice, and (c) perceived competence. Results are discussed based on the research questions posted for this work, and some reflections based on the results are presented

In today's world, it has become very common to find engineers working on multinational projects. As a result, educational institutions need to prepare students to succeed in this global working environment by incorporating global collaborative projects as a learning experience. At the same time, students should be aware of the importance of this experience, recognize its benefit, and be motivated to participate on the projects. It is documented in the literature that students' interest and motivation are important factors contributing to the learning process in any discipline, and of particular importance when students are exposed to a projectbased educational experience in a collaborative and multinational context. Authors have used the multinational collaborative projects to prepare students with global competencies but no formal assessment of the impact of this experience has been done. As part of a formal evaluation of this experience, the main goal of this study is to determine the level of interest and perception of value of engineering students participating in a multinational collaborative project, and make a comparison of such indicators based on gender. For this purpose, a survey based on the Intrinsic Motivation Inventory (IMI) was given to students before starting their participation in the multinational projects. The data collected provides information in five constructs which are: interest, perceived competence, pressure, perceived choice, and value. These constructs provide a perception about students' interests, beliefs, and feelings about the international project that reflect their level of motivation to carry on the tasks.

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ResumenSe presenta un estudio sobre la transferencia de calor en un molde, comparando los ensayos de inyección utilizando moldes con y sin tratamiento superficial de nitruración. Simulaciones del proceso se realizaron con el uso de Asistencia Computacional a Ingeniería (CAE) para determinar los parámetros iniciales que se aplicaron en los ensayos reales en moldes instrumentados de acero P20 (con y sin tratamientos), inyectados con el polímero poliestireno cristal. Los resultados indicaron una reducción del tiempo de enfriamiento y del tiempo de proceso en el molde con el tratamiento, debido a una mejora en la conductividad térmica. Palabras clave: inyección, molde, tiempo de ciclo, enfriamiento, tratamiento superficial Cycle Time Reduction of Thermoplastic Injection using Nitriding Treatment Surface Molds AbstractA study on the heat transfer in a mold, comparing experimental injection tests using a mold with and without surface treatment (nitriding) is presented. Process simulations were carried out using Computer Aided Engineering tools (CAE) for the estimation of the initial parameters to be applied in the tests in instrumented P20 steel injection molds with the polymer crystal polystyrene. Results indicated a reduction of cooling time and of the time of the process in the mold with treatment, due to an increase of the thermal conductivity.

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