The introductory materials science and engineering course offered at the college/university level is, for many instructors, very difficult to design and to teach. This presentation discusses challenges for the course, as well as several problematic issues to include: course content, course organization, and course mechanics. The results of two surveys of engineering faculty are presented and discussed; these provide perspectives and lead to suggestions on how to manage these troublesome areas, and improve the quality of and student satisfaction in this course. Also discussed are commercially available software packages, and, in addition, a hybrid electronic-paper introductory materials textbook.