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Community Service as a Means of Engineering Inspiration: An Initial Investigation into the Impact of the Toy Adaptation Program

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Conference

2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Location

New Orleans, Louisiana

Publication Date

June 26, 2016

Start Date

June 26, 2016

End Date

June 29, 2016

ISBN

978-0-692-68565-5

ISSN

2153-5965

Conference Session

Interactive Session - Community Engagement Implementation for K-12 Settings

Tagged Division

Community Engagement Division

Tagged Topic

Diversity

Page Count

6

DOI

10.18260/p.26520

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/26520

Download Count

509

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Paper Authors

biography

Molly Y Mollica The Ohio State University

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Molly Mollica earned her BS in Biomedical Engineering from Ohio State University in 2014. She is currently a Master's student in Mechanical Engineering with a research focuses in bionanotechnology, mechanobiology, and engineering education. Molly has been working with the Toy Adaptation Project since its start at OSU in 2013.

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Rachel Louis Kajfez The Ohio State University Orcid 16x16 orcid.org/0000-0001-9745-1921

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Dr. Rachel Louis Kajfez is an Assistant Professor of Practice in the Department of Engineering Education at The Ohio State University. She earned her B.S. and M.S. degrees in Civil Engineering from Ohio State and earned her Ph.D. in Engineering Education from Virginia Tech. Her research interests focus on the intersection between motivation and identity of undergraduate and graduate students, first-year engineering programs, mixed methods research, and innovative approaches to teaching. Currently, she teaches within the first-year engineering program at Ohio State while maintaining an active engineering education research program.

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Elizabeth Riter The Ohio State University

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Elizabeth is currently in her 5th year as the Program Manager and Advisor for the Green Engineering Scholars Program at The Ohio State University. She graduated with her B.S. in Civil Engineering from Ohio State in 2007 and with her M.S. in Structural Engineering from Ohio State in 2013. She worked as a Structural Engineer for J.D. Stevenson & Associates in Chicago, IL for 2.5 years designing structural components within nuclear power plants in the midwest. In her current role, she teaches, mentors, and advises first and second year Ohio State engineering students in their pursuit of a degree and career in engineering.

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Meg West The Ohio State University Orcid 16x16 orcid.org/0000-0002-1031-7381

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Meg West is a third year Civil Engineering undergraduate student at The Ohio State University. She is an Undergraduate Teaching Assistant for the Engineering Education Department and a Toy Adaptation Program Intern at The Ohio State University.

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Peter Vuyk The Ohio State University

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Peter Vuyk is a second year undergraduate honors student seeking his B.S. degree in Mechanical Engineering at The Ohio State University.

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Abstract

For many first-year engineering students, what it means to be an engineer is an abstract concept. Introducing major-related classes early in an engineer’s education helps students answer, “what is an engineer?” However, these classes often lack connections between engineering and society. Additionally, current courses do not always effectively support students in becoming experienced problem solvers. To address the connection between engineering and society and to help students develop their confidence in problem solving, the Toy Adaptation Program (TAP) provides students with a hands-on experience modifying electronic toys for children with special needs. These adapted toys are donated to toy-lending libraries and families in-need, so that families are not burdened with the increased cost and inconvenience of purchasing marked-up adapted toys from select toy manufacturers. For this “In Progress” paper for the Community Engagement in Engineering Education Division, we will introduce the program in its current format along with our assessment techniques and next steps.

Mollica, M. Y., & Kajfez, R. L., & Riter, E., & West, M., & Vuyk, P. (2016, June), Community Service as a Means of Engineering Inspiration: An Initial Investigation into the Impact of the Toy Adaptation Program Paper presented at 2016 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, New Orleans, Louisiana. 10.18260/p.26520

ASEE holds the copyright on this document. It may be read by the public free of charge. Authors may archive their work on personal websites or in institutional repositories with the following citation: © 2016 American Society for Engineering Education. Other scholars may excerpt or quote from these materials with the same citation. When excerpting or quoting from Conference Proceedings, authors should, in addition to noting the ASEE copyright, list all the original authors and their institutions and name the host city of the conference. - Last updated April 1, 2015