Courses FDST 4110, 4110L, 6110, 6110L
FOOD PACKAGING and FOOD PACKAGING LABORATORY
FALL Semester 2004 SYLLABUS
Dr. Aaron L. Brody
The University of Georgia
Department of Food Science and Technology
Packaging/Brody, Inc.
P. O. Box 956187
Duluth, Georgia 30095-9504
Telephone: (770) 613-0991
Fax: (770) 613-0992
E-mail: AaronBrody@aol.com
1 August 2004
This course offers an overview of food and beverage packaging and its multiple roles:
- Protecting contained fresh, minimally processed, and fully processed food and beverage products,
- Facilitating distribution, and
- Communicating to retailers, users and consumers.
One objective is to demonstrate the indispensability of food packaging to food science and technology; food production; food marketing; food distribution; and the health, safety and economic well-being of people. This course comprehends technology plus integration with products, distribution and marketing, including consumers.
This course encompasses:
- Definitions;
- Discussions on food and food packaging science and technology and their interactions;
- The reasons for the use of packaging for foods;
- Package materials;
- Package structures;
- Equipment for converting package materials; i.e., making them ready for use.
- Equipment for packaging food and beverage products;
- Graphics and the methods of decorating and enhancing packages, such as printing;
- Economics of packaging;
- Retail and consumer impact and their measurement;
- Laws and regulations governing packaging and the rationales behind them;
- Resources available to food packagers, i.e., users;
- Environmental issues; and
- New and emerging food and beverage packaging technologies.
These courses will include:
- Guest participants from industry.
- Demonstrations to illustrate principles.
- A term project to develop a food package. These projects are judged by food and food packaging industry experts.
- Plant tours
Fall 2004 4110/6110 Food Packaging Preliminary Class Schedule Summary
| Wk. # |
Date | Subject | Assignment Due | Robertson Book Chapters | Soroka Book Chapters |
| 1 | 30 Aug 2004 |
|
1 | 1 | |
| 2 | 13 Sept 2004 |
|
|
1 | 2 |
| 3 | 20 Sept 2004 |
|
-- | ||
| 4 | 27 Sept 2004 |
|
|
10-12,
15-19 |
-- |
| 5 | 4 Oct 2004 |
|
|
2-4, 10-12, 15-19 |
-- |
| 6 | Oct 2004 |
|
|
10-12, 15-19 2-5 |
5-9, 11, 14-16 |
| 7 | Oct 2004 |
|
|
10-12
15-19 2-5 |
5-9, 11, 14-17 |
| 8 | 18 Oct 2004 |
|
|||
| 9 | 25 Oct 2004 |
|
|
2-5 | 5-9,
11, 14-17 |
| 10 | 1 Nov 2004 |
|
15-19
Handouts, references |
19 | |
| 11 | 8 Nov 2004 |
|
|||
| 12 | 15 Nov 2004 |
|
|||
| 13 | 22 Nov 2004 |
|
|
4,12 | 18 |
| 14 | 29 Nov 2004 |
|
|
20 | 3,4 |
| 15 | 5 Dec 2004 |
|
|
All | |
| 16 | Week of 13 Dec 2004 |
|
|
All | -- |
ASSIGNMENTS LIST
Due 30 August: Go to the library or the internet. Find an article in any food or packaging trade or professional periodical on a new packaged food or beverage product and summarize its essential elements in about two pages. One- or two-page written report to be submitted. Be prepared to discuss it in class on 13 September. Bring in/submit the original reference.
- Term project: form teams, select a topic of a food or beverage product to be packaged as your term project. Written reports on your term projects are required weekly (except for mid-term examination week). Verbal presentation by a different team spokesperson is required each week.
Due 13 September : Go to a food store or vending machine or wherever you can purchase a package of food or beverage; select a packaged food or beverage product; and analyze it visually and taste it; and, from your experience, for function. Include protection (against what?), communication, end use, disposal. Submit a one- to two-page written report and be prepared to discuss it in class. If feasible, bring in the package to show it in class.
Term project: submit a product concept. This will be a team effort. Product concept is the product description plus the consumer benefit.
Due 27 September: Term project: product requirements - written and verbal.
Due 4 October: Term project: product requirements/specifications, required to establish packaging specifications. Written report and verbal presentation.
Due 11 October : Term project: Preliminary packaging requirements for your product. Describe the characteristics required of your packageÑmoisture, oxygen, light, visibility, cushioning, breatheability, opening, reclosure, etc. written report and verbal presentation.
Due 25 October : Term project: final packaging requirements/specifications
Written and verbal reports on Rock-Tenn lab and plant tour.
Due 22 November :
- Written and verbal reports on Printpack lab and plant tour.
- Written and verbal reports on Portion Pac plant tour.
- Completed mid-term examination.
- Term project: Alternative package forms to package your product, with justifications for their selection.
Due 29 November :
- Term Project: Prepare a packaging brief. A packaging brief is a document detailing your packaging needs to your food packaging technologists and designers. This is the most complete document you can prepare describing what you expect your packaging colleagues to deliver to youÑand includes a product description and its protective requirements, size, shape, shelf life in which distribution environment, annual output, secondary packaging, retailer requirements, how consumers use the product, expected costsÑ and everything else you can think of that you would want to know if you were the food packaging technologist.
- Term project: Selection of FINAL package from all the alternatives with rationale for selection.
Due 5 December :
- Term project: Final packaging specifications.
- Term project: Economics.
- Term project: Packaging production line description.
- Term project: Graphic information and regulatory compliance sections
Due week of 13 December :
- Complete and turn in take-home final examinations.
- Term project: Completed final written term project report.
- Term project: Prepare for final presentation to industry judges.
RESOURCES
- Food Packaging; Gordon Robertson; 1993; Marcel Dekker, New York, is text.
- Fundamentals of Packaging Technology, 2 nd Edition; Walter Soroka; 1999; Institute of Packaging Professionals, Herndon, Virginia. A supplementary text available in Food Science and Technology office.
- Encyclopedia of Packaging Technology, 2nd Edition; Aaron L. Brody & K. Marsh (eds.), 1997; John Wiley & Sons publisher. Available in the Department of Food Science and Technology office.
- Understanding Plastics Packaging Technology; Susan Selke; 1997; Hansel publisher. Available in the Department of Food Science and Technology office.
- Periodicals:
- Packaging Digest, their Packaging Resources book and the DirectoryÑavailable in the Department of Food Science and Technology office.
- Food and Drug Packaging (distributed in class each month)
- Packaging World
- BrandPackaging (distributed in class each month)
- Flexible Packaging (distributed in class each month)
- Other books, conference proceedings and directories such as Package Machinery Manufacturers Institute (PMMI) Directory are available in the Department of Food Science and Technology office.
GRADES ARE COMPUTED AS FOLLOWS:
- Mid-term take-home examination: - 20%
- Final take-home examination: - 30%
- Term project, including weekly assignments on term project: - 25%
(largely determined by a panel of industry judges) - Written assignments (write-ups of plant tours, etc.): - 10%
- Class participation: - 15%
Examinations will be take home/open book. Students are expected to complete these on their own. They are expected to demonstrate appreciation and understanding of principles learned in class and from the various resources offered them, including the assigned textbook chapters . Graduate and undergraduate students will receive different examinations.
The term project will consist of "theoretically" packaging a food or beverage product of the student team's choice. If students may work in teams, every member of the team receives an equal grade unless circumstances indicate otherwise. Each week, the team will submit a written 1- to 4-page report on its progress on a specific aspect of its project. One member of the team will also deliver a verbal presentation on the week's term project assignment.
On the final week of classes, the team will present its entire project to a panel of judges from industry who will grade the term project. Written final copies of the project report will be submitted on the last day. The team may employ samples, visuals, videos, or any other devices to enhance the report.
The objective is to demonstrate all of the elements that are required to package the product of the team's choice. Laboratory testing is NOT required, but students may perform tests if they desireÑdescribing why these tests are important. Students may have available to them the resources of the companies they have visited to prepare samples and/or testing.
Our objective in this course is not to convert students into food packaging experts, but rather to ensure that when graduates enter industry or other food science and technology pursuits, they will have an appreciation and understanding of the many components required to protect food products in distribution. This course is designed to enable students to have fun while working hard to learn a discipline that is indispensable in food science and technology.
TERM PROJECT
(tentative, subject to change)
Each week, each team should report on its progress on a specific element of the project, with one or more team members reporting verbally, and the team turning in a written report. After editing, this written report can become a chapter of your final written report.
Due 30 August : Form teams, select a topic of a food or beverage product to be packaged. If feasible, a mentor will be identified to help each team in its project. The team will be responsible to communicate with its mentor.
Due 13 September : Submit a product concept : describe the product and its reason for existence; who wants the product in what form and why ; describe what packaging issues you perceive to be resolved by your project.
Due 27 September : Preliminary product requirements/specifications : What are the product's needs in terms of retarding deterioration, shelf life, exposure to the environment that might be ameliorated by packaging. Quantitative data are useful for this section.
Due 4 October: Product requirements : Based on product specifications, what do you think is required in terms of protection (barriers against what?), communication, distribution, access, dispensing, etc.
Due 11 October : Preliminary packaging requirements Ñbased on critical analysis of product requirements.
Due 25 October : Final package requirements.
Due 22 November: Submit alternative packaging forms that might be employed by your team to satisfy the packaging brief. Justify each alternative with sound technical and marketing reasoning.
Due 29 November : Packaging brief : Now that you have been exposed to some real-life packages, and know what the product requirements are, what do you as the chief of research or product development ask your packaging development manager to deliver? Here you are detailing every element of needs to satisfy your technical needs and the marketing department's desires. These are Òrequests.Ó
Select the best alternative OR another alternative, if necessary; justify the selection.
Due 5 December : Final packaging specification with all the quantitative support data; modifications of the packaging line if required.
Describe the packaging machinery line for packaging the product. Be prepared to detail the type of equipment and your reasons for selecting it.
Economics , i.e., costs of packaging.
Graphic and regulatory information. You need not offer a design for a package unless a member of your team or close friend is a particularly good artist.
Week of 13 December : Term project completed . Final presentations to a panel of industry judges. Written reports to be submitted on this day. Your grade for the term project will be largely based on the grades issued to you by the panel of industry judges.
FIELD TRIP REPORTS
After each field trip, please submit a written report and be prepared to discuss in class what you saw and learned from the plant visit. What was the significance of the laboratory or factory or both to this course in food packaging? What was its significance in terms of your food science and technology career? Would you recommend this plant visit to any of your classmates or for next year's food packaging students? Support your opinion with your reasoning.
NOTE : Examinations and assignment papers are NOT accepted by fax or e-mail without prior approval.
I am available to answer your questions or to help before or after class, and by telephone, fax or e-mail at any time.
Have fun while you are learning about food packaging.
Aaron L. Brody, Ph.D.