WIP: Initial Investigation of Effective Teacher Professional Development Among Experienced and Nonexperienced Engineering Teachers
- Conference
- Location
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Virtual On line
- Publication Date
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June 22, 2020
- Start Date
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June 22, 2020
- End Date
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June 26, 2021
- Conference Session
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Pre-college Engineering Education Division Technical Session 9
- Tagged Division
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Pre-College Engineering Education
- Page Count
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8
- DOI
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10.18260/1-2--35547
- Permanent URL
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https://peer.asee.org/35547
- Download Count
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438
Paper Authors
Jennifer L. Kouo
Towson University
orcid.org/0000-0002-4609-8555
Jennifer L. Kouo, is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Special Education at Towson University in Maryland. Dr. Kouo received her PhD in Special Education with an emphasis in severe disabilities and autism spectrum disorder (ASD) from the University of Maryland at College Park. She is passionate about both instructional and assistive technology, as well as Universal Design for Learning (UDL), and utilizing inclusive practices to support all students. Dr. Kouo is currently engaged in multiple research projects that involve multidisciplinary collaborations in the field of engineering, medicine, and education, as well as research on teacher preparation and the conducting of evidence-based interventions in school environments.
Medha Dalal
Arizona State University
orcid.org/0000-0001-5705-1800
Medha Dalal is a postdoctoral scholar at Arizona State University. With an educational journey that has spanned multiple disciplines including Electrical Engineering, Computer Science, and a doctorate in Education, Medha is interested in research at the intersections of engineering, technologies, and education. Three thrusts that define her research interests include, ways of thinking that address complex educational challenges, democratization of K-12 engineering education, and online/blended learning. Her research seeks to build capacity for engineering education stakeholders at the grassroots, while also informing policy.
Bruk T. Berhane Florida International University
Dr. Bruk T. Berhane received his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University of Maryland in 2003. He then completed a master’s degree in engineering management at George Washington University in 2007. In 2016, he earned a Ph.D. in the Minority and Urban Education Unit of the College of Education at the University of Maryland.
Bruk worked at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, where he focused on nanotechnology, from 2003 to 2005. In 2005 he left JHU/APL for a fellowship with the National Academies where he conducted research on methods of increasing the number of women in engineering. After a brief stint teaching mathematics in Baltimore City following his departure from the National Academies, he began working for the Center for Minorities in Science and Engineering (CMSE) in the Clark School of Engineering at the University of Maryland.
In 2011, he began working directly under the Office of the Dean in the Clark School, coordinating outreach and recruitment programs for the college. In 2016, he assumed the role of director of the Office of Undergraduate Recruitment and Scholarship Programs. His duties entailed working with prospective freshmen and transfer engineering students.
In 2019, he transitioned to the role of Assistant Professor in the School of Universal Computing, Construction, and Engineering Education at Florida International University. His research interests transfer students who first enroll in community colleges, as well as developing broader and more nuanced engineering performance indicators.
Jumoke 'Kemi' Ladeji-Osias
Morgan State University
orcid.org/0000-0002-8645-696X
Dr. J. ’Kemi Ladeji-Osias is Professor and Associate Dean for Undergraduate Studies in the School of Engineering at Morgan State University in Baltimore. Dr. Ladeji-Osias earned a B.S. in electrical engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park and a joint Ph.D. in biomedical engineering from Rutgers University and UMDNJ. Dr. Ladeji-Osias’ involvement in engineering curricular innovations includes adapting portal laboratory instrumentation into experiments from multiple STEM disciplines. She enjoys observing the intellectual and professional growth in students as they prepare for engineering careers.
Kenneth Reid Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University
Kenneth Reid is an Associate Professor in Engineering Education at Virginia Tech. He is active in engineering within K-12, serving on the TSA Board of Directors. He and his coauthors were awarded the William Elgin Wickenden award for 2014, recognizing the best paper in the Journal of Engineering Education. He was awarded an IEEE-USA Professional Achievement Award in 2013 for designing the nation's first BS degree in Engineering Education. He was named NETI Faculty Fellow for 2013-2014, and the Herbert F. Alter Chair of Engineering (Ohio Northern University) in 2010. His research interests include success in first-year engineering, engineering in K-12, introducing entrepreneurship into engineering, and international service and engineering. He has written texts in design, general engineering and digital electronics, including the text used by Project Lead the Way.
Cheryl Beauchamp Regent University
Cheryl Beauchamp serves as the Engineering and Computer Science Department chair of Regent University’s College of Arts and Sciences. She is a PhD student in the Engineering Education program at Virginia Tech. She earned her Master’s of Science degree in Computer Science from George Mason University and her Master’s of Education degree from Regent University. Her research interests include Computer Science education, STEM education, teamwork design, online learning, and cybersecurity.
Adam R. Carberry
Arizona State University
orcid.org/0000-0003-0041-7060
Dr. Adam Carberry is an associate professor at Arizona State University in the Fulton Schools of Engineering Polytechnic School. He earned a B.S. in Materials Science Engineering from Alfred University, and received his M.S. and Ph.D., both from Tufts University, in Chemistry and Engineering Education respectively. His research investigates the development of new classroom innovations, assessment techniques, and identifying new ways to empirically understand how engineering students and educators learn. He is currently the chair of the Research in Engineering Education Network (REEN) and an associate editor for the Journal of Engineering Educaiton (JEE). Prior to joining ASU he was a graduate student research assistant at the Tufts’ Center for Engineering Education and Outreach.
Stacy S. Klein-Gardner Vanderbilt University
Dr. Stacy Klein-Gardner serves as an Adjunct Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Vanderbilt University. She is the external evaluator for the Engineering For Us All (E4USA) project. She chairs the ASEE P12 Committee and is a Fellow of the society.
Abstract
The Bureau of Statistics identified an urgent demand for science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) professionals in the coming years. In order to meet this demand, the number of students graduating with STEM degrees in the United States needs to increase by 34% annually [1]. Engineering for US All (E4USA): A National Pilot Program for High School Engineering Course and Database is a NSF-funded first-of-its-kind initiative designed to address this national need. The E4USA project aims to make engineering more inclusive and accessible to underrepresented minorities, while increasing racial, ethnic, and gender representation in higher education and the workforce. The “for us all” mission of E4USA encompasses both students and educators. The demand for engineering educators has increased, but relying on practicing engineers to switch careers and enter teacher preparation programs has been insufficient [2, 3, 4]. This has led schools to turn to educators with limited training in engineering, which could potentially have a significant national impact on student engineering education [5, 6, 7]. Part of the E4USA pilot year mission has been to welcome educators with varying degrees of experience in industry and teaching. Paramount to E4USA was the construction of professional development (PD) experiences and a community of practice that would prepare and support teachers with varying degrees of engineering training instruction as they implemented the yearlong course. The perspectives of four out of nine educators were examined during a weeklong, intensive E4USA PD. Two of four educators were considered ‘novices’; one with a background in music and the other in history. The remaining two educators were deemed ‘veterans’ with a total of 15 years of experience as engineers and more than 20 years as engineering educators. Data sources consist of focus groups, surveys, and artifacts created during the PD (e.g., educators’ responses to reflection prompts and letters written to welcome the next cohort). Focus group data is currently being analyzed using inductive coding and the constant comparative method in order to identify emergent themes that speak to the past experience or inexperience of educators with engineering. Artifacts were used to: 1) Triangulate the findings generated from the analysis of focus group, and 2) Further understand how the veteran educators supported the novice educators. We will also use quantitative survey data to examine descriptive statistics, observed score bivariate correlations, and differences in mean scores across novices and veterans to further examine potential common and unique experiences for these educators. The results aim to highlight how the inclusion of educators with a broad spectrum of past experiences with engineering and engineering education can increase educators’ empathy towards students who may be equally hesitant about engineering. The findings from this study are expected to result in implications for how PD and a community of practice may be developed to allow for reciprocal support and mentoring. Results will inform future efforts of E4USA and aim to change the structure of high school engineering education nationwide.
Kouo, J. L., & Dalal, M., & Berhane, B. T., & Ladeji-Osias, J. K., & Reid, K., & Beauchamp, C., & Carberry, A. R., & Klein-Gardner, S. S. (2020, June), WIP: Initial Investigation of Effective Teacher Professional Development Among Experienced and Nonexperienced Engineering Teachers Paper presented at 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual On line . 10.18260/1-2--35547
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