Collection

2009 Pacific Southwest Section Meeting

Authors

Raman Menon Unnikrishnan; Ricardo V. Lopez

interaction on a student’s academic choices (student-to-student relationships),quality and nature of teacher-student relationship, quality of science instruction, quality ofstudent-centered teaching, and incorporation of best teaching practices based on research. Additionally, pedagogical solutions that seek to meet the needs of diverse engineeringstudents should implement strategies that complement the typical steps they take when seekinghelp: first they reach out to fellow students for advice and then to their instructors, subsequentlyinformal study groups and then finally formal learning services (tutoring centers, etc).13,14,15These approaches should also accommodate their preference for interactive approaches tolearning, more interaction

Collection

2009 Pacific Southwest Section Meeting

Authors

Frederick Harris; Gordon Lee; Stuart H. Rubin; T. C. Ting; Billy Gaston; Gongzhu Hu

305Learning [2], “digital competence” and ”learning to learn” are among eight key competences forcitizens in order to easily adapt to a rapid changing and highly interconnected world. The importance of computing and computers in engineering education has been knownfor several years and several educators have shared their experiences and activities in this regard.For example, in [3-5], engineering education researchers in the disciplines of civil engineeringand computational science have developed special software tools which enhance the academicenvironment. These computer-based instructional guides supplement the teacher in the classroomby providing design examples, additional practice problems in the computational aspects of thefield, and

Collection

2009 Pacific Southwest Section Meeting

Authors

Donna M. Schaeffer; Patrick C. Olson

experience is not credible? This is often witnessed in computerprogramming. What is the best approach to teaching programming? There have been groups thatadvocate that you use a language that is designed to teach programming. Others advocate that youteach a language used by a relevant community to help the students adapt to that community. Whilethis might seem minor – consider the idea that there are computing programs in existence in theUnited States that taught COBOL and only COBOL for more than twenty-five years. Also considerthe idea that there is a body of discussion about how COBOL is the worst language to use forteaching programming. Who was right is not a matter for this paper, however, the question “WouldCOBOL have been an introduction to

Collection

2009 Pacific Southwest Section Meeting

Authors

Engineering, Environmental Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Computer Engineering and Mechanical Engineering) and six research centers. It has more than 2,100 students and approximately 55 full-time faculty. In 2007- 2008 the College received more than $2.5 million in external grants and contracts for research and program administration and graduate student support. In addition to his duties at San Diego State University, Dr. Hayhurst serves on the Workforce/Education Committee of the San Diego Economic Development Corporation, and is a member of the Board of Directors of CONNECT and of the Engineering and General Contractor Foundation. He has been active in K-12 outreach and facilitated the designation of San Diego State