Conference Session

Normative Commitments and Public Engagement in Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Gary Downey, Virginia Tech

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

Division, he is also co-founder of the International Network for Engineering Studies (www.inesweb.org) and co-editor of its journal Engineering Studies (www.tandf.co.uk/journals/engineeringstudies). Page 15.1368.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2010 1 What is Global Engineering Education For?: The Making of International Educators1 One approach to the question “What is global engineering education for?” is to examine thecareer trajectories of

Conference Session

Liberal Education for 21st Century Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John Heywood, Trinity College Dublin

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

Technological Change.1 Her general thesis was accompanied by illustrationsfrom the history of MIT, where as a social historian, she is Director of MIT’s program inScience, Technology and Society. Subsequently in 2003 she published a short butcontroversial paper in The Chronicle of Higher Education with the intriguing title“Education for the profession formerly known as engineering.” 2Williams argues that engineering has lost its identity because it “has evolved into anopen-ended profession of everything in a world where technology shades into science,art, management with no strong institutions to define an overarching mission”.The consequence of this for engineering education is that there are numerous forces thatpull engineering in different

Conference Session

Liberal Education for 21st Century Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Betty Harper, Pennsylvania State University; Lisa Lattuca, Pennsylvania State University; Alexander Yin, Penn State University; Patrick Terenzini, Pennsylvania State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

Education for a Changing World, commonly referred to as theGreen Report.3 The Green Report argued that “with the end of the Cold War, engineeringeducation needed a new set of guiding principles to replace those that had been developedfollowing World War II. Rather than a world based largely on superpower competition andnational security, engineers now faced a world of intense international economic competition andwidespread public uncertainty about the uses of technology” (Preface, paragraph 1) The reportcalled for an increased focus on skills and activities such as teamwork, communication,appreciation for diversity, multidisciplinarity, and understanding of societal contexts and largelyforeshadowed the changes to ABET’s (Accreditation Board for

Conference Session

Normative Commitments and Public Engagement in Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Erin Cech, University of California, San Diego

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

constructparticular areas of social reality.1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Because of their unparalleled influence in the complextechnical systems pervading post-industrial society, engineering professionals are obligated toengage in work that serves the public good and to engage with issues of public welfare whensuch issues come into contact with their professional domain.4 Professionals acknowledge thesocietal obligations bestowed upon them by learning and following formal and informal codes ofethical practice.6 A responsibility for taking public welfare into account as they practiceengineering is central to the professional duties of the engineer: “Engineers hold paramount thesafety, health and welfare of the public in the performance of their professional duties

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education II

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robert Heard, Carnegie Mellon University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

! ∀ ∀ ∀ # ∀ ∃ % # &∋ ∀ ( ∀ ) ! ) ∀ ∀ ∀ ∀ ∀ ∀ ∗ ∀ ) ∀ ∀ + % ! , ∀ + − ∀ ∀ ∗ ∀ .∋ − Page 15.750.2 /∋ ( + 0∋ 1 ∀ ∗ ∗ 23

Conference Session

Communication - Needs and Methods

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sarah Lockwood, University of Calgary; Daryl Caswell, University of Calgary; Marjan Eggermont, University of Calgary

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

team drawn from all divisions of engineering, fine arts andcommunications. This paper serves to examine the role and work of the communicationsinstructor within that interdisciplinary team, and to offer some insight into the ways thatcommunications can be integrated into the engineering curriculum, as well as the benefitsthat communications brings to the instructor team.Because of the unique interdisciplinary structure of these courses, the communicationsinstructor holds a tri-partite position as a solo instructor, a team instructor, and as thecourse technical writer.As a solo instructor, the communication instructor delivers 6-8 1-hour lectures persemester, on a combination of communication theory and practical writing and oralpresentation

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education II

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Katherine Wikoff, Milwaukee School of Engineering

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

: Lessons on Innovation from Creative Communities “If you are lucky enough to have lived in Paris as a young man, then wherever you go for the rest of your life, it stays with you, for Paris is a moveable feast.” ~ Ernest HemingwayIn his commencement address to Stanford University’s graduating class of 2005, Appleco-founder Steve Jobs recalled how, after dropping out of Reed College in his freshmanyear, he stuck around campus and experienced what can arguably be described as one ofthe most fortuitous learning experiences in the history of the world [1]: Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on ever

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education I

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

David Layton, DeVry University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

sciencefundamentals have picked up the high school method of using science fiction to teach science.Because of the high-school science orientation, lessons using science fiction often avoid mattersof ethics. Gary Raham’s5 Teaching Science Fact With Science Fiction (2004) proposes usingscience fiction to “turn kids on” to science (p. 1). Raham seeks to use science fiction to “generatescience-based epiphanies” (p. 5). Sample concepts from Raham’s curricula include teaching thedifference between instinct and learning (p. 3), using scientific errors in TV and film sciencefiction to teach correct science (p. 49), learning about insect metamorphic life cycles (p. 52),teaching Newton’s theory of gravity (p. 57), and so on. Raham wants to avoid many of theethical

Conference Session

Liberal Education for 21st Century Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Nadia Kellam, University of Georgia; Joachim Walther, University of Georgia; Tracie Costantino, University of Georgia; Bonnie Cramond, University of Georgia

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

communicating effectively.1-5 Unfortunately, the implementation of this drive toprovide breadth to an undergraduate education often results in a general education curriculumwith a set of disparate and disconnected courses, instead of an integrated experience.6-7 Webelieve that the undergraduate experience must provide some coherence across courses,extracurricular activities, service learning and student life. In the Greater Expectations report, theAssociation of American Colleges and Universities recognizes the “fragmentation of thecurriculum” as a significant “barrier to high quality”.8 Similarly, the Boyer Commission onEducating Undergraduates in the Research University explains that “the freshman experienceneeds to be an intellectually integrated

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education II

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Paul Ross, University of Wisconsin, Madison

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

professionalism; theestablishment of social and intellectual communities improve student attitudes and retention.The FIGs program at UW-Madison is a cross-campus opportunity; most FIG courses are NOT inengineering – note that data summarized in Table 1 is based on 32 FIGs classes, only TWO ofwhich were in the College of Engineering – and both were “freshman comp” classes.In brief overview, students elect to join the FIGs program for their first semester work; they thenregister for a core class plus two linked classes. They usually have the same dorm housing andare encouraged to build a social and intellectual community within the larger university setting.For an overview of FIGs at UW-Madison, visit: http://www.lssaa.wisc.edu/figs/As already stated, the

Conference Session

Normative Commitments and Public Engagement in Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

George Catalano, State University of New York, Binghamton; Caroline Baillie, Western Australia; Donna Riley, Smith College; Dean Nieusma, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute; Chris Byrne, Cascadia Community College; Margaret Bailey, Rochester Institute of Technology; Katy Haralampides, University of New Brunswick

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

groups and encouraged totalk about the various parts of the problems, each student is ultimately responsible for submittinghis/her own work.Additionally as part of the grading structure in place for this course, students have weeklyhomework assignments, an out-of-class final exam and an in-class final exam. Theserequirements add up to 60% of the total final score.Integration of Issues using Course ModulesStudents were assigned four course modules after the introductory portion of the course. Eachmodule accounted for 10% of the final grade and in addition each had both a technical part and areflective essay part. Brief descriptions of each of the various modules used in the first twoofferings of the course follow. ≠ Course Module 1: Gini

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education II

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

George Catalano, State University of New York, Binghamton

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

in-class discussions and theseeming increase in interest in sustainability and sustainable engineering. At least the course didno harm. 1. My interest in 13 3 23.1 % Low subject before 4 30.8 % Medium course 6 46.2 % High 2. My interest in 13 0 0.0 % Low subject after 5 38.5 % Medium course 8 61.5 % High 3. Difficulty 13 2 15.4 % Low (relative to other

Conference Session

Communication - Needs and Methods

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Christine Nicometo, University of Wisconsin, Madison; Kevin Anderson, University of Wisconsin, Madison; Traci Nathans-Kelly, University of Wisconsin, Madison; Sandra Courter, University of Wisconsin-Madison; Thomas McGlamery, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

identify the ways thatpracticing engineers developed their epistemic frame9.The first of three methods used to collect our qualitative data involved interviews andobservations with practicing engineers within six different organizations across a spectrum ofengineering employers. Specifically, we aimed to work with employers from government andindustry, from small to large-multinational conglomerates in size, and across a broad range ofwork sectors. For more information about the six organizations we worked with during ourstudy, see Table 1. Page 15.1391.3 Table 1: Study Sites Overview. In choosing sites, we focused on getting a range of

Conference Session

Historical Perspectives for Engineering Education

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Rachel Maines, Cornell University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

AC 2010-605: ENGINEERING AS LAW: INJURY EPIDEMIOLOGY ANDCONSENSUS CODESRachel Maines, Cornell University Page 15.477.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2010 1 Engineering as Law: Injury Epidemiology and Consensus CodesAbstract British Field Marshal John Slessor observed during World War II that the first socialservice a nation can provide for its people is to keep them alive.1 As the recent experience of theHaiti earthquake has forcefully brought home to us, engineering safety codes and standards playa major role in this vital function of government.2 ,3 From the point of view of keeping citizensalive, the

Conference Session

Liberal Education for 21st Century Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Cherrice Traver, Union College; J. Douglas Klein, Union College

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

”) courses.The grant supported several methods to help faculty find one another, including social events,faculty meetings, as well as direct suggestions from the PIs. As noted in the assessment sectionbelow, some of the most successful matches were likely to have happened even in the absence ofthe grant because one or both of the faculty members involved were predisposed to make thekind of connections that the grant promoted.Table 1 provides a summary of each of the kinds of interactions, and this is followed bydescriptions of particular examples. Page 15.779.4Type of Interaction Description Duration

Conference Session

Communication - Needs and Methods

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Michael Alley, Pennsylvania State University; Joanna Garner, Pennsylvania State University, Berks Campus; Sarah Zappe, Pennsylvania State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

projecting onto slides. This paper first presents a theoretical basis for this metric and then applies themetric to several situations. Two of these situations are common practice situations inengineering education: (1) presentation of research at a national ASEE conference, and(2) presentation of research by graduate students. Three other situations involvealternative slide structures: (3) the assertion–evidence slide structure;9, 23 (4) theslide:ology slide structure,10 which is similar to the Presentation Zen structure;11 and (5)the Larry Lessig method of presentation.12 The paper concludes with recommendations ofhow many projected words per minute would be appropriate for engineeringpresentations

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education I

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Deborah Sinnreich-Levi, Stevens Institute of Technology; Susan Metz, Stevens Institute of Technology; David Silverstein, Stevens Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

’ engagement with “multiple stakeholders –government, private industry, and the public” and remarks, “The increasing imperative foraccountability will necessitate an ability to communicate convincingly and to shape the opinionsand attitudes of other engineers and the public.” 1 Further, In Raising Public Awareness ofEngineering, the NAE concludes that the need to improve public awareness about engineeringamong an array of lay audiences is considerable. Elected representatives are ill-equipped to makedecisions about technology-related issues, and students, parents and teachers remain uninformedabout engineering and the contributions of the field which continues to deter students fromstudying engineering. 2 The American Association for the Advancement

Conference Session

Historical Perspectives for Engineering Education

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Atsushi Akera, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

emergence ofadvanced new strategic weapons systems. Still but a relatively minor industryduring the interwar period, one stunted by the Great Depression, it was themassive scale of war production, and then Cold War research, development, andproduction that brought the aviation industry into full fruition. In the process, thisindustry catapulted Southern California‟s economy past its traditional base inagriculture and natural resources-based extractive industries. This meant thatFigure 1. Lockheed advertisement, Scientific American (May 1951). Reproduced, Courtesy LockheedMartin Corporation. The advertising copy reads, in part: “There‟s a better life waiting for you and your family in Southern California—at Lockheed. Here, in beautiful, sun

Conference Session

Communication - Needs and Methods

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Warren Waggenspack, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge; Sarah Liggett, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge; Warren Hull, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge; David Bowles, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge; Stephen Sears, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge; Daniel Thomas, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge; Paige Davis, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

students and the Advisory Group members prefer it to the oral slide presentations used inthe past because of the teaching moments created by the interactive nature of posterpresentations. Advisory group members were able to home in on areas of particular interest tothem, and students were able to glean valuable insights from the Advisory Group. Examples ofstudents’ posters are shown in Figures 1 and 2. Names and advisor information have beenremoved from these figures. Page 15.718.5  Figure 1 - Example of Completed Project Presentation.  Figure 2 - Example of

Conference Session

Historical Perspectives for Engineering Education

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Alice Pawley, Purdue University; Karen Tonso, Wayne State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

underrepresentation in the context of Purdue, and creating new models via institutional ethnography. Her past research has focused on using the metaphor of a boundary as a tool to better understand how faculty determine what counts as engineering, and to identify how engineering might be understood as a gendered discipline. Address: School of Engineering Education, 701 W. Stadium Ave., West Lafayette, IN 47907, 1-765-496-1209 (v), apawley@purdue.edu.Karen Tonso, Wayne State University Karen L. Tonso, an Associate Professor of Social Foundations in the College of Education at Wayne State University, uses approaches common to cultural anthropology to study the structure of schooling, especially the

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education I

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Kyle Simmons, University of Utah; Susan Sample, University of Utah; April Kedrowicz, University of Utah

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

oral communication, and emphasized again in lectures onwritten communication. We also established methods, such as instructor consultations withindividual teams and soliciting students’ responses with TurningPoint software, which we canbuild upon and expand in future semesters as we work toward increasing active learning as a wayto enhance engineering education.Student FeedbackStudent feedback about the course and instruction was solicited via course evaluations. Studentswere asked to respond to several prompts regarding instruction on a 1-5 likert-type scale with 1being strongly disagree and 5 being strongly agree. Because we implemented a revisedcurriculum this Fall, we were especially interested in comparing student feedback from Fall

Conference Session

Normative Commitments and Public Engagement in Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Juan Lucena, Colorado School of Mines; Jen Schneider, Colorado School of Mines; Jon Leydens, Colorado School of Mines

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

about the Page 15.475.2history of engineers in development or about the complexity of engaging and listening tocommunities? To fill that void, we conducted historical, ethnographic and other investigations.The main outcomes of this project are a course and a book for engineering students, faculty andpractitioners involved in courses, programs and projects related to ETH. Here we outline themain elements of this project and provide recommendations on where and how to use it inengineering curricula.1. Background of this projectOur journey to ESCD began in a previous curricular experiment in humanitarian engineering.After receiving a large grant

Conference Session

Historical Perspectives for Engineering Education

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Amy Slaton, Drexel University; Mary Ebeling, Drexel University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

onskilled labor. Instead, we believe that ideas about distributions of skill and opportunity inindustry, and ideas about racial, gender or other differences in identity, dynamically reinforceone another. That is, as organizational sociologists have put it, ideas about desirable kinds andlevels of diversity in a workforce are reflected in, "who is hired or given positions ofresponsibility in organizations, who gets access to organizational resources or decision making,and who gets rewarded for their contributions and on what basis."1 Technical training andeducation play a tremendous role in associating more and less advantaged social groups witheligibility for different kinds of jobs.2 We here consider the nature of technical curricula inAmerican

Conference Session

Innovative Courses/Pedagogies in Liberal Education I

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Ari Epstein, MIT; Joellen Easton, American Public Media; Rekha Murthy, Public Radio Exchange; Emily Davidson, MIT; Jennifer de Bruijn, MIT; Tracey Hayse, MIT; Elise Hens, MIT; Margaret Lloyd

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

report that their experience inthe class has improved their ability to frame and communicate ideas, but they also describepositive outcomes in a variety of other areas. Some general categories into which studentoutcomes fall are: 1. Improved communication skills 2. Enhanced ability to see and understand issues from multiple perspectives 3. Strengthened teamwork skills 4. Increased competence in listening and interviewing, outside the radio context 5. Greater self-confidence 6. Discovery of new areas of interest or enthusiasm, which they intend to pursue more deeply1. Communication Skills: In Terrascope Radio students learn how to communicate their ideas toa lay audience, and to do it in such a way that the audience continues to

Conference Session

Liberal Education for 21st Century Engineering

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robert Grondin, Arizona State University; Chell Roberts, Arizona State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

rigorously analyticalapproach to learning. In most cases, nearly all credits not used to satisfy universitygeneral studies requirements were allocated to math, science and engineering. Theseprograms in fact closely approximated the description that one finds in chapter 2 ofSheppard et al.1. This team was asked to avoid duplicating any of these degrees.Otherwise, the slate was clean. After extensive discussions, it was decided to build ageneral engineering program that emphasized three values: engaged learning, agility anda focus on the individual.As our goal was ABET accreditation, we developed a set of program outcomes, one ofwhich we called perspective. The perspective outcome is: An understanding of the role and impact of engineering in