Case Study: San Jose State University achieves industry-ready designers and accelerated CAD competency with SolidWorks

Preparing Silicon Valley’s future innovators with SolidWorks Education Edition

San Jose State University faced the challenge of better preparing industrial design students for industry by unifying a fragmented toolset and tying foundational courses to engineering and manufacturing practices. To address this, the university standardized its curriculum on SolidWorks Education Edition from vendor SolidWorks so students could learn a single, industry-relevant design platform that supports modeling, surfacing, and design-for-manufacturing.

SolidWorks implemented the Education Edition across SJSU’s Industrial Design Program as the curriculum foundation, accelerating CAD competency, enabling inclusion of the Certified SolidWorks Associate exam in finals, and improving designer–engineer collaboration. As a result, SJSU revamped its curriculum and saw measurable gains in project sophistication—exemplified by the student-built Arbor Solar Seating—along with faster skills acquisition and higher readiness for industry using SolidWorks.

San Jose State University

Leslie Speer

Associate Professor