Conference Session

The New ABET CE Criteria - Program Development

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Brian Swenty, University of Evansville; Mark Valenzuela, University of Evansville; James Allen, University of Evansville; Immanuel Selvaraj, University of Evansville

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

Assessing Program Educational Objectives Using a Web-Based Alumni Survey SystemAbstractABET’s Criteria for Accrediting Engineering Programs for 2009-2010 defines ProgramEducational Objectives (PEOs) as “broad statements that describe the career and professionalaccomplishments that the program is preparing the graduates to achieve.” The criteria furtherstates that “each program for which an institution seeks accreditation or reaccreditation musthave in place an assessment and evaluation process that periodically documents anddemonstrates the degree to which these objectives are attained.”1 For EAC-ABET visits in 2007-2008, 36.7% of the engineering programs visited received a PEO related weakness at theconclusion of the visit.2In

Conference Session

Innovations in Civil Engineering Education III

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sarah McCubbin-Cain, University of Kentucky; Bruce Tschantz, University of Tennessee - Knoxville

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

Infrastructure, noting that the number of dams identified as “unsafe” isincreasing at a faster rate than those being repaired.The disastrous levee failures resulting from Hurricane Katrina and a recent report by the NationalCommittee on Levee Safety3 that cited a need for “creating a cadre of national levee experts”also underscore the need to recruit students into careers dedicated to dam and levee safety. Inaddition to the nearly 90,000 dams listed in the National Inventory of Dams, the U.S. is home toan estimated 114,000 miles of federal and non-federal levees, many of uncertain condition.According to surveys of association members conducted by the authors in 2004 and 2009, thereis an inadequate supply of qualified candidates for jobs relating to dam

Conference Session

Implementing the CE BOK into Courses and Curricula

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Angela Bielefeldt, University of Colorado, Boulder

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

civil engineering in 2025 andbeyond. 2 It is important that students who aspire to become civil engineers to understand theskills, knowledge, and attitudes that they will be expected to have when they enter the workforce.If students gain an early understanding of these issues they may either be more or less motivatedto pursue a degree in civil engineering. For example, many students today in “Gen Net” aremotivated by social good and wanting to make the world better; however, they often do notperceive that engineering is a way to achieve this goal.10 A career that benefits society has beenfound to be even more motivational to female and minority students.14 Parikh9 determined that

Conference Session

Civil Engineering Division Poster Session

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

James Bowen, University of North Carolina, Charlotte

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

, faculty, and employers alike see passing the FE exam as animportant first step in a Civil Engineering career. Historically, FE pass rates at our Universityhave slightly trailed both national averages and those for our Carnegie classification-basedcomparator group for those students taking the Civil Engineering specific afternoon exam. Therelative difference in pass rates, however, has been quite variable over the years. Recently,department faculty have responded to this situation by conducting an analysis of curriculumissues related to student preparation for the FE exam and by implementing new measuresdesigned to improve student preparation and FE exam pass rates. An analysis of the most recenttest performance found that there was a

Conference Session

Civil Engineering Division Poster Session

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sinead MacNamara; Clare Olsen; Laura Steinberg, Syracuse University; Samuel Clemence, Syracuse University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

creativity in engineering students. The principal aim of thetrans-disciplinary course under discussion here is to investigate the degree to which theintegration of architecture and engineering pedagogy is successful in producing desirableoutcomes for either group of students. Given their different but potentiallycomplementary skill sets, engineering and architecture students are a natural fit forinvestigations into creative pedagogy. In fact, the practices of both disciplines areintimately related and, yet, students whose careers may be so closely linked, rarely haveopportunities for cross-disciplinary interaction in their formative years, least of all indesign contexts where dialogue and collaboration could be so productive for both.2

Conference Session

Implementing the CE BOK into Courses and Curricula

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Michael Doran, University of WIsconsin-Madison; Charlie Quagliana, University of WIsconsin-Madison; Norman Doll, University of WIsconsin-Madison; Jeffrey Russell, University of Wisconsin, Madison; Greg Harrington, University of WIsconsin-Madison

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

manner to ethical, environmental, economic, legal, political, and social issues.These departmental Educational Objectives further state that Bachelor of Science in CivilEngineering (BSCE) graduates are to be prepared to contribute to their communities through thefollowing career and professional accomplishments and abilities:1. To plan, design, construct, and manage both natural and built processes and systems to meet determined needs using technical knowledge, computer skills, and design principles with communication, leadership, and team skills;2. To utilize measurement and analysis tools along with experimental data in investigating natural and built systems;3. To understand and incorporate economic, environmental, political, social

Conference Session

CE Capstone: Innovations in Learning & Assessment

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Charlie Quagliana, University of WIsconsin-Madison; Jeffrey Russell, University of Wisconsin, Madison; Michael Doran, University of WIsconsin-Madison; Rod Hassett, University of WIsconsin-Madison; Greg Harrington, University of WIsconsin-Madison

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

semester. Eachstudent group has at least one industry mentor (and in many cases two) that works with the groupthroughout the semester.Before the semester begins, students respond to a questionnaire and provide a brief resume toinstructors. Instructors review the information and assign students to teams in one of three areasof focus; General Building, Transportation or Environmental, based upon their academiccoursework and performance, practical experience, and career goals.Active student involvement is the key to successful engagement of students in this course.Twelve of the 17 class assignments are design team related. This ranges from preparing writtenproposals and summaries to the development of drawing specifications and contract

Conference Session

Innovations in Civil Engineering Education II

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Kristen Sanford Bernhardt, Lafayette College; Steven Beyerlein, University of Idaho; Andrea Bill, University of Wisconsin; Shashi Nambisan, Iowa State University; Ida van Schalkwyk, Oregon State University; Rod Turochy, Auburn University; Rhonda Young, Texas Christian University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

this, transportation engineers need a broad background aboutdifferent elements in this system. The breadth and complexity of the transportation system is oneof the aspects that makes a career in transportation appealing, but it is also one of the largestchallenges in educating the future transportation engineer.Traditionally, most transportation engineers graduate from undergraduate programs in civilengineering. Within the undergraduate civil engineering curriculum, three-quarters of theprograms require one or two transportation engineering courses to introduce civil engineeringstudents to the profession by providing a broad background of the field1. Most often, students donot take these courses until the junior year of the program. Elective

Conference Session

Civil Engineering Division Poster Session

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Scott Hamilton, United States Military Academy

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

. “Attitudes are the ways one thinks and feels in response to a fact or situation.Attitudes reflect an individual’s values and world view and the way he or she perceives,interprets, and approaches surroundings and situations.”6 It is further explained that during theundergraduate experience future engineers need to begin developing supportive attitudes, andthat these attitudes will need to be modeled by those charged with their education, the staff andfaculty. The aim being that students can model these supportive attitudes themselves upongraduation, or at least be aware of them.6 The author feels that responsible social behavior fitsinto one of these professional attitudes. The disastrous effects of alcohol abuse on any career arewell know, and sadly

Conference Session

Learning by Doing

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

James Morgan, Texas A&M University; Luciana Barroso, Texas A&M University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

Civil Engineering at Texas A&MUniversity has two distinct Masters degrees: the Master of Engineering (ME) program and theMaster of Science (MS) program. The MS program is research based, requiring the developmentof thesis research, while the ME program is the pre-professional degree. Both programs share acore set of courses and include an increase in basic structural engineering skills. However, whileMS students are working on their thesis research, the ME students are taking additional coursesfocused on professional preparation. The dual tracks by no means limit a student’s career path; itis simply a different emphasis.Prior to the Fall of 2009, the ME degree differed from the MS only in (1) not requiring thewriting of a thesis, and (2

Conference Session

Fulfilling the CE BOK2 - Case Studies

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Brett Gunnink, Montana State University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

development.Some graduates can expect to be able to: 6. Enter the surveying profession and become licensed to practice surveying; 7. Begin careers in the construction industry; 8. Or earn advanced degrees in Civil Engineering or other fields.Courses in the first two years of the program develop a student's mathematical skills andunderstanding of the physical principles that underlie the practice of civil engineering.Engineering science courses in the second, third, and fourth years develop the student's ability toapply mathematics and basic scientific principles to the solution of practical engineeringproblems. The third year student develops a broad perspective of the field and establishes thefoundation for professional practice and

Conference Session

Enhancing CE Learning Through Use of Technology

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Monique Head, Texas A&M University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

in pursuingIt was found that students were more attentive during lectures when they knew that a response,and hopefully the correct response, would be required of them. Each lecture consisted of aspeaker, typically a faculty member from a specific subdiscipline within the civil engineeringdepartment. (A schedule of the course topics is shown in Table 1). During the presentations,various aspects and challenges faced by those in the profession were emphasized along withresearch needs and career paths. During each lecture, the students were to respond to at least Page 15.1304.2three (3) questions that were prepared by the speaker. Attendance was

Conference Session

Learning by Doing

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Nicholas Melin, United States Military Academy; Richard Hallon, United States Military Academy; Joseph Hanus, United States Military Academy

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

leader of character who can understand, implement, and manage technology;and to inspire cadets to a career in the United States Army and a lifetime of personal growthand service.The Department mission statement includes educating and inspiring, which align along a set ofcommonly accepted educational taxonomies; that is, Bloom’s Taxonomy, which is based on theseminal work of the 1950’s educational committee chaired by Benjamin Bloom. The committeeestablished a set of taxonomies in three domains of learning: cognitive, affective andpsychomotor. The cognitive domain taxonomy is widely accepted in many fields and has beenidentified as, “arguably one of the most influential education monographs of the past halfcentury.”3 The taxonomies are a language

Conference Session

Enhancing CE Learning Through Use of Technology

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Ghulam Bham, Missouri University of Science and Technology; Dan Cernusca, Missouri University of Science and Technology; Uday Manepalli, Missouri University of Science and Technology; Ronaldo Luna, Missouri University of Science and Technology

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

career as a civil engineer. This lab allowed me to see where most accidents occur and what factors may have played a role. (266 characters, question 2)It is helpful for highway design, monitoring and decision-making on traffic safety issues Student 22 R: Strengths: showed the details that must be looked at while designing highways, allowed me to see how certain conditions play a role in accidents, want to know how to use it in more detail and what engineers do to fix some of the problems identified, how the latest technology can be used to design. (245 characters, question 2) Page

Conference Session

Learning by Doing

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Deborah McAvoy, Ohio University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

knowledge retention of engineering students as they advance through their academiccareers can enhance their quality of education and career success. However, engineeringprofessors constantly battle the quality of student knowledge retention from course to course.Knowledge retention has been a consistent problem for students regardless of the length of breakbetween courses, such as a one-week break or a three-month summer break. This is evidenced ina study conducted by the United States Military Academy at West Point (1). Student knowledgeof Statics and Strength of Materials were examined after a three-month summer break in theMechanics course. Faculty found that knowledge retention of the Statics and Strength ofMaterials topics was poor. They

Conference Session

Civil Engineering Division Poster Session

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Yusuf Mehta, Rowan University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

y 4continuing education; and/or other professional EIT exam impact of professionalpractice issues (ABET P). licensure on their career. students wrote Outcome 1: GraduatesGoal 4 - Objective 1: The Civil Engineering y lab reports and 4 will write effectively.Program at Rowan University will produce

Conference Session

Civil Engineering Division Poster Session

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robert Rabb, United States Military Academy; John Rogers, United States Military Academy

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

positive impact from the seminar.Additionally, these simple hands-on exercises appear to be effective to increase interest andenthusiasm for engineering as a possible academic path or career. Student comments anddiscussion on the student surveys reinforce their overall ratings. Free text survey responses areconsistently positive as noted below: “I don’t know too much about engineering, and I’m not too great at math… so I thought I would hate it, but I really enjoyed it.” “I was very entertained with my experience. It was extremely fun. I want to really be a part of this and would like to do this as my major, hopefully at USMA. It was more than interesting.” 5 4.27

Conference Session

Fulfilling the CE BOK2 - Case Studies

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Debra Larson, Northern Arizona University; Joshua Hewes, Northern Arizona University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

orientation andcommitment to professional practice. The D4P is a four-year sequence of classes that werecarefully designed through a joint industry and university effort to provide all engineeringstudents with hands-on learning and the continuous practice of a broad set of professional skillsin better preparation for careers as engineering practitioners. The program builds these technical,managerial, and professional skills by increasing project intensity, technical difficulty, andprocess complexity one step (course) at a time. EGR 186 and 286 are multi-disciplinary coursesfollowed by the disciplinary CENE 386W, 476, and 486C. Each preceding D4P course serves asa prerequisite to the proceeding one and fosters the accumulation of skills and knowledge

Conference Session

Fulfilling the CE BOK2 - Case Studies

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Kevin Sutterer, Rose Hulman Institute Of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

. The learning experience at Rose-Hulmanfeatures a strong emphasis on • thorough treatment of the theoretical foundations of students’ degrees, • practice-oriented project-based learning, • highly accessible faculty mentors, • proactive assistance with internship and career placement, and • a campus environment with ample opportunities for development of leadership skills, community outreach, and programs to broaden students’ perspectives through local, national and international activities.The Department of Civil Engineering includes approximately 170 students with seven full timefaculty members. Every department faculty member holds a professional license or is preparingfor professional licensure, and every

Conference Session

The New ABET CE Criteria - Program Development

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Debra Larson, Northern Arizona University; Allen Estes, California Polytechnic State University; Norman Dennis, University of Arkansas; Ronald Welch, University of Texas, Tyler; Carol Considine, Old Dominion University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

., is a Professor in the Department of Civil Engineering at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. Before joining the U of A faculty in 1996, he served in the US Army as an engineer officer for 24 years. During his military career Dennis had the unique opportunity to build roads, airfields and other facilities on six different continents and spend over 11 years as a member of the faculty at the US Military Academy. His current research interests include laboratory and field determination of geotechnical material properties for transportation systems and the use of remote sensing techniques to categorize geohazards. He has published over 85 peer reviewed articles relating to his research and

Conference Session

Innovations in Civil Engineering Education II

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Steven Burian, University of Utah; Edward Barbanell, University of Utah

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

. At the beginning of the semester did you see yourself aligned as a humanist or technologist when considering solutions to water resources challenges? Do you feel your attitudes have changed such that you might align more or less with the other group? 2. Which topic/discussion provided you the greatest insight into the other group (humanist or technologist)? 3. As a result of this course, do you feel you better understand and can articulate the position of perspectives different than yours as they relate to water resources engineering projects? 4. List one concept outside of your disciplinary major that you learned in this course. Do you feel it will be helpful for you in your future career? How so? 5

Conference Session

CE Capstone: Innovations in Learning & Assessment

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Ryan Fries, Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville; Brad Cross, Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville; Susan Morgan, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

2008 and spring 2009) and one semester after (fall 2009) the course format change.One of the first questions asked students to rate the statement “This course has increased myinterest in Civil Engineering.” Figure 1 shows the responses, where the grey bars are the“before” case and the black bars are the “after” case. These findings indicate a strong shifttowards self-reported student interest in their major and future career. Page 15.159.9 8Page 15.159.10Page 15.159.11Page 15.159.12Page

Conference Session

Fulfilling the CE BOK2 - Case Studies

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

George List, North Carolina State University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

” come  first, and to the extent that the nearly 200  firms who recruit our students at the twice­yearly career fairs have expectations that NC State students will have a particular suite of civil engineering skills, and the department aims to provide those skills. It  also  does  assert that  ABET  requirements  are  viewed  as  minimum  requirements that  must  be met, not an optimal target. Expanding the scope of those expectations (read as being constraints), unnecessarily, as  might  easily occur with an explicit  conformance to either BOK1 or BOK2, is not advantageous nor is it necessarily important in meeting the needs of our customers. This having been said, the department’s “customers” are true civil engineering firms, both local and

Conference Session

Learning by Doing

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

James O'Brien, Villanova University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

throughout theHabitat for United States. From 2004 thru 2007, Villanova sent the most students out of 1989Humanity approximately 250 campus chapters. In the Two-day program, Villanova works with local Habitat affiliates Approximately 800 VU students sign up each year, Learning Partners is an online tutoring and mentoring program between VillanovaLearners undergraduates and students at the School of the Future (SOTF). Participants workConnect! together through an online course that is focused on career/college goals with SOTF 2006Learning learners. The program has the

Conference Session

CE Capstone: Innovations in Learning & Assessment

Collection

2010 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Ronald Welch, University of Texas, Tyler; Michael McGinnis, University of Texas, Tyler

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

have effective oral, written, and graphical communicationskills). The wording gave the impression that it was describing skills and knowledge thatstudents should have at the time of graduation rather than future career and professionalaccomplishments. The