Traditional chemical engineering curricula present the first formal course for the major in the sophomore year; it is customarily a course in mass and energy balances. Courses taught earlier in the student calendar are usually either a survey course, in which chemical process industries (or the research interests of the faculty) are summarized, or a course in stoichiometry, emphasizing mass balances in steady-state systems. We concluded that a different freshman course was needed. We wanted a course to strengthen traditional curricula and to encourage students with diverse backgrounds to join the chemical engineering profession.

Professor Duncan had previously assumed responsibility for Engineering 112 at Cornell University, a survey course intended to introduce chemical engineering, but one not required for the major. This course was one of several introductory courses created by Cornell's College of Engineering in the early 1980s. A course to introduce design and analysis was developed and, although well received, suffered from the lack of a suitable textbook. Professor Reimer, who was responsible for the mass and energy balance course at Berkeley, was discouraged by the disparate student motivation and performance in the first required course for the major. Furthermore, the introductory mass and energy balance course was becoming overburdened with multiple (and sometimes conflicting) goals, including application of conservation principles, mathematical modeling, process spreadsheeting, computer methods, problem solving, and reviews of chemical technology.