One of the foundational learning outcomes of upper level engineering electronics courses is the analysis and implementation of discrete amplifier design. While it is relatively straight-forward to implement these designs in the lab, the application of amplifiers in practice may be difficult for students to understand.A simple application of discrete amplifier circuits is the analysis and design of guitar effects pedals. Effects pedals, and in particular overdrive, fuzz, and distortion circuits, demonstrate keystone concepts of electronics, including single stage amplifier design, multistage amplifier design, clipping, biasing, and variable parameter control. In addition, the implementation of these amplifiers in a small package size (within a metal enclosure) provides an excellent avenue for exposing students to printed circuit board (PCB) layout and prototyping. One benefit of these circuits is that they can be used with an input device (guitar) and an output device (audio amplifier) and students can physically observe (and hear) the results of their design. One particular benefit of this approach is a greater understanding of frequency response characteristics, as students are able to hear the results.In this work, several lab projects were developed for an upper level engineering electronics course to leverage guitar pedal design for teaching discrete amplifier design and PCB layout. This paper presents these projects, resources for implementing the projects, as well as assessment results from the initial offering of this course. In addition to direct assessment of the amplifier design course objectives, qualitative student survey results are presented. Both the direct assessment and student survey results suggest that this approach was effective in helping students better understand amplifier analysis and design.

Mechatronics Engineering is a multidisciplinary field that draws from computer, electrical, and mechanical engineering and applies these topics to a variety of applications of electromechanical systems including robotics, control, and automation. Engineers in this field are vitally important in continued development of autonomous vehicles, industrial robotics, and space exploration vehicles. Anderson University has recently been awarded ABET accreditation in Computer Engineering, Electrical Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering. Based on the disciplines represented at Anderson University, mechatronics is a logical choice for further development of upper-level elective courses. Students with experience in mechatronics are increasingly valuable in the automation and manufacturing workforce. Many students who attend Anderson University in STEM related fields had their interest in STEM developed by robotics programs in their youth. Furthermore, recent participation in the Autonomous Division of the evGrandPrix competition has developed a deep interest in Mechatronics System Design by existing students. This paper details the development of a Mechatronics System Design course, intended to enhance the existing curricular offerings in each of the accredited engineering disciplines. Literature on other mechatronics courses describes wide variations in course design and most lack enough information to fully implement. This work will present, in brief, the details of each project, and the projects created as a result of this work will be made publicly available for use by other institutions. The assessment strategy is presented, as are results from the pilot offering of the course. These results are affected by the change in instruction mode required due to the COVID-19 pandemic.