Conference Session

FPD9 - First Year Learning & Assessment

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Eric Johnson, Valparaiso University; Doug Tougaw, Valparaiso University; Kenneth Leitch, Valparaiso University; Barbara Engerer, Valparaiso University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

mutually exclusive, an optimal firstengineering course would benefit from adopting the best characteristics of each. By balancingthese different philosophies, it may be possible to design a course that is more effective than anyone philosophy could be. We have attempted to design such a balanced course, modeled afterwork done at Purdue University9, which helps students to learn the fundamentals of severalengineering disciplines and build interdisciplinary connections among those disciplines, and wedo so through a balance of traditional classroom and hands-on laboratory and design experiences. Page 13.63.33. GE 100 OverviewValparaiso University’s

Conference Session

1553 FPD3 - Computer & Programming Tools in First Year Instruction

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

David Illig, Clarkson University; John Hrynuk, Clarkson University; Matthew Pennington, Clarkson University; John P. Dempsey, Clarkson University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

departments. In August 2006, Professor John Dempsey invited agroup of sophomore engineering students who had just taken the class to attend a workshop onthe course to share their experiences. This workshop resulted in the introduction ofundergraduate teaching assistants (UTAs) in each ES100 classroom.These UTAs provided, and continue to provide, input on revisions for many aspects of ES100,including course format, topics covered, and laboratory experiments. In particular, the UTAswere able to use their experiences in ES100 to assist in the redesign of course materials to bemore consistent, uniform, and mainstream, assisting in Professor Dempsey’s goal of making allengineering freshmen at Clarkson feel comfortable using MATLAB and LabVIEW. In

Conference Session

FPD6 - First Year Curricula Development

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Gregory Wight, Norwich University; R. Danner Friend, Norwich University; Jacques Beneat, Norwich University; William Barry, Norwich University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

hours and three laboratory hours each week. The delivery of material in the lecturessupports the projects and skills that the students work on in their laboratory. With a nominalclass size of 100 students, two lecture sections were created with approximately 50 students ineach section, and five laboratory sections were created with approximately 20 students in eachlab section. Four instructors from each of the three engineering disciplines shared the courseload each semester. This diversity in the instructors supports the multi-disciplinary nature of thecourse. The specific projects, lecture topics, and homework assignments were common to allsections; however, each instructor was responsible entirely for the delivery of the material intheir

Conference Session

FPD1 - Early Success and Retention

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jale Tezcan, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale; John Nicklow, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale; James Mathias, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale; Lalit Gupta, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale; Rhonda Kowalchuk, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

13.182.3 Figure 2. Components of the retention program at COEThe Introduction to Engineering course exhibits radical departure from the COE’s tradition inwhich each engineering department in the College offered its own introductory course. Logisticalproblems related to scheduling, laboratory space, and equipment resources were resolvedthrough a very concerted effort across the college. The course has been implemented withexisting resources. This organization and development of Introduction to Engineering course ispresented below.Development of the Course:Until Fall 2007 Semester, each department in the COE offered their own introductory course.The content of these courses varied widely from teaching computer applications to

Conference Session

1553 FPD3 - Computer & Programming Tools in First Year Instruction

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jess Everett, Rowan University; John Chen, Rowan University; Stephanie Farrell, Rowan University; Jennifer Kadlowec, Rowan University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

150-minute laboratory session each week. Students from all four disciplines are mixed insections of approximately 20 students each. The course serves as both an introduction to collegeand an introduction to engineering. Lectures focus on survival skills and other topics importantto freshman engineers, such as note taking, problem solving, engineering estimation, significantfigures, professionalism and ethics. Approximately eight of the laboratory sessions are devotedto open-ended project-based learning used to reinforce lecture topics. The rest are used forexams, to view and discuss videos, etc.Freshman Clinic I is additionally designated as a “Rowan Seminar” course. Rowan Seminarclasses are university-wide courses designed to help freshmen

Conference Session

FPD4 - Teaching Methods for First Year Students

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

David Hall, Louisiana Tech University; Stan Cronk, Louisiana Tech University; Patricia Brackin, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology; Mark Barker, Louisiana Tech University; Kelly Crittenden, Louisiana Tech University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

ENGR 121 2 ENGR 122 2MATH 240 3 MATH 241 3 MATH 242 3CHEM 100 2 CHEM 101/103 2/1 PHYSICS 201* 3 * Students in chemical engineering postpone physics and take an additional chemistry here. The “original” ENGR 12X freshman engineering course sequence between 1998 and the spring of 2007 included engineering fundamentals (circuits, materials balance, and statics), computer applications (Excel, Mathcad, and Solid Edge), statistics, engineering economics, teamwork, communication skills, and a design project. The students did most of their work in teams, including homework problems, laboratory

Conference Session

FPD10 - Freshman Engineering Introduction to Design

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Phil Schlosser, Ohio State University; Michael Parke, Ohio State University; John Merrill, Ohio State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

addition to his teaching activities, he has started several successful electronics companies in Columbus, OH.Michael Parke, Ohio State University Dr. Parke has been teaching courses in the First-Year Engineering Program at The Ohio State University for the past eight years. He earned dual B.A. and B.S. degrees in Mathematics and Physics from Humboldt State University and a Ph.D. degree in Physical Oceanography from U.C. San Diego. He worked for 12 years at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory on satellite missions and the design of satellite missions. He then worked at the Center for Space Research at the University of Colorado and later at The Ohio State University, on global applications of

Conference Session

FPD10 - Freshman Engineering Introduction to Design

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Michael Swanbom; David Hall, Louisiana Tech University; Kelly Crittenden, Louisiana Tech University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

of the course is spent learning about circuits thoughthe use of a Parallax® Boe-Bot10 that each student purchases for themselves. This robot serves asthe overall platform for laboratory and design activities throughout the freshman year and isreally the backbone for the curriculum. Its use is not discussed further here. However, it doesprovide an opportunity for students to implement working circuits on a breadboard and tomeasure both current and voltage well before they are required to compute the electrical energyusage of the pump during the analysis stage of the project. Students also learn about linearregression and learn to use Microsoft Excel® just before starting the pump project. The finalthing that students do is to review the

Conference Session

FPD2 - First-Year Advising and Transition

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Lisa Romkey, University of Toronto

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

than in high school? How do you feel about the quality of instruction in the program? Do you feel comfortable with your instructors? Do you feel comfortable interacting with them in small groups, or in a one-on-one situation? Where do you learn the most? In class? In laboratory? When working individually? When working on your own? In tutorials? What do you find particularly challenging about learning from a lecture? Do you find that learning is more independently-driven than when you were in high school? How do you feel about assessment in university? Is there anything else you’d like to add about the challenges in transitioning from high school to university?After

Conference Session

FPD7 - Global Warming & Sustainability for First-Year Students

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Amber Kemppainen, Michigan Technological University; Gretchen Hein, Michigan Technological University; David Shonnard, Michigan Technological University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

to sugar and 85-92% conversion of sugar to ethanol leads to anoverall process efficiency of approximately 50%.2,3,4 When looking at this kind of processefficiency, two major questions arise: is a biomass-to-ethanol process using lignocellulosicbiomass as a feedstock a sustainable solution? If not, what can be done to make this process aviable long-term alternative to fossil fuels? As part of their ENG1102 experience, MichiganTech students will answer these questions.Biomass-to-Ethanol FacilityThe basic design for the biomass-to-ethanol facility for the alternative fuel design process isbased upon an ASPEN Plus Simulation developed by National Renewable Energy Laboratory(NREL) in 1999. This process, shown in Figure 1, uses yellow poplar as a

Conference Session

FPD7 - Global Warming & Sustainability for First-Year Students

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Blair Rowley, Wright State University; Kumar Yelamarthi, Central Michigan University; Thomas Bazzoli, Wright State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

cause is going to require theeducated attention of many disciplines. One of these has to be engineering as engineers aretrained in the practical application of science and technology to meet human needs. What isbeing presented here is how we have restructured part of our course to provide lecture contentand laboratory experiences on global warming.We are fortunate to have a course that provides the framework to accomplish this, our freshmancourse EGR 190 Fundamentals of Engineering and Computer Science (FECS).This course has been modified to include pre and post global warming perception surveys, anintroduction to global warming using the video “An Inconvenient Truth”, mini lectures onalternative energy and two lectures and labs involving solar

Conference Session

FPD5 - Teaming and Peer Performance

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Claribel Bonilla, University of San Diego; Leonard Perry, University of San Diego

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

Graduates and Their Impact on Curriculum Design," J. Engr. Ed., 82(4), Oct 1993 4. R. A. Guzzo and M. W. Dickson, "Teams in organizations: recent research on performance and effectiveness," Annual Review of Psychology, vol. 47, pp. 307, 1996. 5. J. R. Katzenbach and D. K. Smith, The Wisdom of Teams: Creating the High Performance Organization. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press, 1993. 6. J. S. Byrd and J. L. Hudgkins, "Teaming in the design laboratory," Journal of Engineering Education, vol. 84, pp. 335, 1995. 7. E. Seat and S. M. Lord, "Enabling effective engineering teams: a program for teaching interaction skills," Journal of Engineering Education, vol. 88, pp. 385, 1999. 8. Personal Strength

Conference Session

FPD6 - First Year Curricula Development

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jon Sticklen, Michigan State University; Mark Urban-Lurain, Michigan State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

instructor. In high enrollment courses that have both lecture and laboratory components, studentratings of the lead faculty instructor may have two components: student attitudes about thecourse based on perceptions of the lead faculty person, and student attitudes about the coursebased on perceptions about the student’s teaching assistant (TA). It could be conjectured thatthese two sources of attitudes about the course merge in the perception of a student, and that animportant factor in the rating a student gives to a faculty person is the rating the student gives tohis TA or vice versa. Certainly, anecdotal evidence is available that if a student is unhappy witha TA, the same student may be unhappy with the course in general, and with the

Conference Session

FPD6 - First Year Curricula Development

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Laura Ruhala, University of Southern Indiana; Richard Ruhala, University of Southern Indiana; Eric Sprouls, University of Southern Indiana

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

Engineering) and ENGR 108 (Intro to Design). Other courses she is teaching are Dynamics, Dynamics of Machinery, and Engineering Materials. She is a member of ASEE and is developing a biomechanics laboratory as a center for research in bone and joint care.Richard Ruhala, University of Southern Indiana Richard Ruhala earned his BSME from Michigan State in 1991 and his PhD in Acoustics from The Pennsylvania State University in 1999. He has three years industrial experience at General Motors and three years at Lucent Technologies. He has been an Assistant Professor rank in the Engineering Department at USI since 2002, and has taught several of the freshmen engineering courses, including ENGR 103 and

Conference Session

FPD5 - Teaming and Peer Performance

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Arlisa Labrie Richardson, Arizona State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

such as furniture, toys or model plane according to instructions 1 2 3 4 5 4 Assembled items such as furniture, toys or model plane without instructions 1 2 3 4 5 5 Used common household tools such as screwdrivers, saw, hammer, drill, etc. 1 2 3 4 5 Created or modified an existing mechanical items to improve or change it's 6 1 2 3 4 5 operation, (i.e. toy, small appliance, computer, cell phone, etc.) Used common science laboratory equipment

Conference Session

FPD7 - Global Warming & Sustainability for First-Year Students

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Blair Rowley, Wright State University; Kumar Yelamarthi, Central Michigan University; Thomas Bazzoli, Wright State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

of laboratories to afocus on two areas of interest to engineers that involved global warming. The lectures focused onalternative energies and alternative fuels and the labs focused on solar and wind energy sources,and hydrogen fuel cells. In addition, the length of the lectures was increased by a half hour. Thisadditional time was used to present the DVD “An Inconvenient Truth” and its update over a fourweek period, and provided discussion time on global warming. At the beginning and end of thecourse the students answered a global warming perception instrument. This paper focuses on theresults obtained from this perception instrument. Page

Conference Session

FPD4 - Teaching Methods for First Year Students

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Michael Haungs, California Polytechnic State University; John Clements, California Polytechnic State University; David Janzen, California Polytechnic State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

introductory computer science course hasapproximately 20 items to grade per student. In our cornerstone course, see Section 3.0, we have9 individual items to grade per student and (4 * TotalStudentCount / TeamSize) groupassignments to grade. For our class size and team sizes, we roughly have the equivalent of 11individual assignments to grade – a savings of 55%.Due to the collaborative nature of the course and active learning, laboratory hours are used astimes when students discuss technical difficulties with each other and work to solve those issuesinstead of following detailed instructor exercises. Since the course concentrates on design,students are free to use various resources (Internet, library, domain experts) to help themovercome difficulties

Conference Session

FPD1 - Early Success and Retention

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Donna Reese, Mississippi State University; Robert Green, Mississippi State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

or introduced them to another engineering major which was more interesting to them.Even the students who decide not to major in engineering value the course for helping them tomake that decision. One student wrote on his evaluation form “I learned a great deal about themajor I chose. And I also learned that I didn’t want to do engineering but am thankful that youhelped me make up my mind.” The most common comment from students on whatimprovements could be made to the class were suggestions dealing with having hands-onprojects, segregating the class at times to focus on particular majors, and having actual visits tothe departments to see facilities and laboratories rather than having the departmentalrepresentative come and make a presentation

Conference Session

FPD4 - Teaching Methods for First Year Students

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John K. Estell, Ohio Northern University; Laurie Laird, Ohio Northern University; John-David Yoder, Ohio Northern University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

,” Proceedings of the 2006 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference, paper 2006-911, Chicago, IL, June 2006.2. J.-D. Yoder, B. K. Jaeger, and J. K. Estell, “One-Minute Engineer, Nth Generation: Expansion to a Small Private University,” Proceedings of the 2007 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference, paper 2007-599, Honolulu, HI, June 2007.3. J. Renaud, C. Squier, and S. C. Larsen, “Integration of a Communicating Science Module into an Advanced Chemistry Laboratory Course,” Journal of Chemical Education, vol. 83, no. 7 (July 2006), pp. 1029-1031.4. J. Renaud, personal communication, 11 September 2006.5. J. K. Estell and J. K. Hurtig, “Using Rubrics for the Assessment of Senior Design