Conference Session

Building Communities for Engineering Education Research

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Maura Borrego, Virginia Tech; Ruth Streveler, Colorado School of Mines; Nancy Chism, Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis; Karl Smith, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities; Ronald Miller, Colorado School of Mines

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

2006-1042: DEVELOPING AN ENGINEERING EDUCATION RESEARCHCOMMUNITY OF PRACTICE THROUGH A STRUCTURED WORKSHOPCURRICULUMMaura Borrego, Virginia Tech MAURA BORREGO is an assistant professor of Engineering Education at Virginia Tech. Dr. Borrego holds an M.S. and Ph.D. in Materials Science and Engineering from Stanford University. Her current research interests center around interdisciplinary collaboration in engineering education, including studies of the collaborative relationships between engineers and education researchers and how engineering faculty learn educational research methods.Ruth Streveler, Colorado School of Mines RUTH A. STREVELER is the Director of the Center for Engineering Education

Conference Session

Climate Issues for Women Students

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Ashlyn Munson; Barbara Moskal, Colorado School of Mines; Wanda Dann, Ithaca College; Stephen Cooper, Saint Joseph's University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

and control groups. The students in the control group were computer science majors; thestudents in the treatment group were a mix of computer science and other majors. CCP chose twodifferent courses in which to implement the curriculum. The first introduced a modified version of theAlice curriculum as a module in a course in which the primary focus was computer literacy. The modulelasted for two to three weeks on average, and focused primarily on the tutorial sessions available in theAlice software. Certain sections of this course were designated as treatment, others as control. In addition,CCP integrated the Alice curriculum into an introductory programming course as a five-week module. Nocontrol groups were selected for this course. TC3 had

Conference Session

Curricula of the Past, Present, and Future

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Wendy Harrison, Colorado School of Mines; Ruth Streveler, Colorado School of Mines; Ronald Miller, Colorado School of Mines; Arthur Sacks, Colorado School of Mines

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

content of the program. Using a format of informal seminars and workshops weengaged in a discovery period for the field of Public Affairs [9-13] leading us to identify criticalcharacteristics for an undergraduate minor in public affairs which have the potential forrecognition by both ABET and the Higher Learning Commission of the North CentralAssociation, and the National Association of Schools of Public Affairs and Administration [9].We determined that critical characteristics of such a Program should include: • A core curriculum, which incorporates and helps students integrate the following topics: Economics; Finance and Budgeting; Statistics and Modeling Techniques; Public Policy and Policy Analysis; Ethics

Conference Session

Curricula of the Past, Present, and Future

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Yvonne Ng, College of St. Catherine; Lori Maxfield, College of St. Catherine

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

the curriculums of Connections and Identity but these curricula may not be explicitly taught. Capstone projects are used to assess how students integrate all of these curriculums.With such an analysis, it is easy to articulate why the traditional program has failed to serve at-risk populations such as women: By concentrating the Core and Practice up front, this program Page 11.1316.6may discourage or misrepresent the discipline for those, particularly women, who need somesense of Connection to society and Identity to the field.5Recent innovative efforts in engineering education can be understood using the PCM language: By

Conference Session

Curricula of the Past, Present, and Future

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Amy Banzaert, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; John Duffy, University of Massachusetts-Lowell; David Wallace, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

JOHN J. DUFFY is a Professor in the Mechanical Engineering Department, the Coordinator for the Solar Engineering Graduate Program, and the Director of the Center for Sustainable Energy at the University of Massachusetts Lowell. He has written over 70 papers on solar engineering, environmental analysis, and education. He has integrated service-learning into nine engineering courses at the undergraduate and graduate level with local and international projects and is the principal investigator on an NSF grant to integrate service-learning into the entire curriculum of the college of engineering at UML. He also coordinates the Village Empowerment project which has designed and installed over

Conference Session

Student Teams and Design Skills

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Susan Mohammed, Pennsylvania State University; Gül Okudan, Pennsylvania State University; Madara Ogot, Pennsylvania State University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

thebeneficial effects of higher tolerance for ambiguity on increased efficacy, satisfaction, andconflict resolution in the context of an open-ended, team-based, industry-sponsored engineeringdesign project.Keywords: Design teams, tolerance for ambiguity, efficacy, design performance.1. IntroductionBecause “engineering programs must demonstrate that their graduates have: …an ability todesign a system, component, or process to meet desired needs,” and “an ability to function inmulti-disciplinary teams….”1, design is integrated to the engineering curricula through the use ofdesign teams. In many cases, this integration also uses industry-sponsored design projects. Mostof the industry-sponsored design project applications are at the capstone design level

Conference Session

Student Teams and Design Skills

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Gül Okudan, Pennsylvania State University; Madara Ogot, Pennsylvania State University; Girish Rao, SPRINT

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

information software is compared to that of a controlgroup, which was not provided with the software. The results indicate a reduction in thenumber of information integration errors, the time needed for data analysis and the perceivedworkload of the designer. These results have implications for the engineering educationclassroom where design is an integral part of the curriculum.1. IntroductionThe design process is a complex information intensive activity requiring the designer tocoordinate and integrate a large amount of information from different sources, formats, mediaand locations to arrive at a solution for a given design problem. With increasing globalizationof products and services, engineering design firms have been forced to improve

Conference Session

Assessment

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Faouzi Bouslama, Zayed University; Azzedine Lansari, Zayed University; Akram Al-Rawi, Zayed University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

Carolina State University in 1992. From 1992-1998, he was a senior researcher at MANTECH, NC. He joined Zayed University in August 1998. Currently he is an assistant professor of Information systems. His research interests include systems modeling, educational technology and curriculum design in Information Systems. His teaching interests include instructional technology and statistical modeling.Akram Al-Rawi, Zayed University Akram is a Professor of CIS at Zayed University, UAE. He has worked at several academic institutions of which the last two were the University of Missouri-Columbia and Columbia College, MO. His teaching interests in-clude programming languages, logic design, and

Conference Session

Innovative Classroom Techniques

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Eileen Kowalski, U.S. Military Academy; Joe Manous, U.S. Military Academy

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

authors have begun a multi-year research programto assess a specific area of basic science education, general chemistry, within an environmentalengineering education. Chemistry was selected as an area of investigation because of itsrepetitive application within the environmental engineering curriculum and, as such, provides abasic science topic that should be reasonably well understood by all environmental engineeringundergraduates. A cohort of 12 seniors majoring in an ABET accredited environmentalengineering program at the United States Military Academy were interviewed a few monthsbefore graduation on selected chemistry topics. Each student was presented with five questions(Table 1) and asked to work the problems on a blackboard, explaining to

Conference Session

Knowing Our Students III

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Guili Zhang, University of Florida; YoungKyoung Min, University of Florida; Matthew Ohland, Clemson University; Timothy Anderson, University of Florida

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

eightsemesters with a GPA over 3.0, pointing to the need for qualitative research of that population tolearn if they are leaving because the early curriculum failed to give them an accurate impressionof what lay ahead. There is also evidence that students who are the least likely to succeed inengineering are the least aware of their predicament, which has implications for engineeringadvising and academic policymaking.II. Prior research on predicting engineering attritionThe graduation rate of undergraduate students who matriculate in engineering is not muchdifferent from that for the general student population, and the rate increases significantly afterstudents reach a ‘threshold’ of progress in engineering.1 The pool of students graduating highschool

Conference Session

Student Teams and Design Skills

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Steven Zemke, Gonzaga University; Donald Elger, University of Idaho

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

2006-187: CURRICULAR ELEMENTS THAT PROMOTE PROFESSIONALBEHAVIOR IN A DESIGN CLASSSteven Zemke, Gonzaga University Steven C. Zemke, an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Gonzaga University in Spokane Washington teaches sophomore, junior, and senior level design courses. His research interests include enriched learning environments, non-traditional instructional methods, and design processes. Before changing careers to academia Steven was a design engineer and manager in industry for 20 years.Donald Elger, University of Idaho Donald F. Elger, a Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Idaho in Moscow, has been actively involved with traditional research and

Conference Session

ERM Potpourri

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Katie Sullivan, University of Utah; April Kedrowicz, University of Utah

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

train studentsin “technical communication” have prioritized writing over speaking. Second, most approachesto communication skill development include an emphasis on either integrating writing and Page 11.625.2speaking into an introductory and/or capstone engineering course or offering a TechnicalCommunication course specifically for engineering students. Third, research in this area oftenhighlights previous attempts to incorporate or develop writing assignments using a writing-in-the-disciplines approach while relying on industry representatives and/or alumni to providediscipline-specific, genre-based knowledge. While these approaches to

Conference Session

Curricula of the Past, Present, and Future

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Cristina Pomales-Garcia, University of Michigan; Yili Liu, University of Michigan; Virginia Soto, University of Michigan

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

research and activities, CASEE has definedspecific and measurable outcomes to challenge itself and the engineering community to achieveits goal of excellence in engineering education by defining excellence of engineering educationin terms of its effectiveness, engagement and efficiency.Along with institutional goals as standards of excellence, research in engineering educationshows that an integral part of the process is providing the undergraduates with opportunities todevelop individual characteristics that will positively impact the students’ future career.Rugarcia et al.2 state that an integral part of the engineer profile is the development of three maincomponents: knowledge, skills, and attitudes that dictate the goals toward which students

Conference Session

Student Misconceptions and Problem Solving Abiltiy

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Ronald Miller, Colorado School of Mines; Ruth Streveler, Colorado School of Mines; Barbara Olds, National Science Foundation and Colorado School of Mines; Michelene Chi, University of Pittsburgh; Mary Nelson, University of Colorado; Monica Geist, University of Northern Colorado

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

of the participants had completed at leastone course in thermal or transport sciences (e.g. heat transfer, fluid mechanics,thermodynamics).The new question set was administered to 29 chemical engineering seniors, all of whomhad completed courses in fluid mechanics, heat transfer, thermodynamics (2 courses),mass transfer, and an integrated transport phenomena course. These students alsoanswered 3 heat transfer questions from the TTCI (Meltice, Carpet, Hotplate) to comparetheir performance with the TTCI beta test results. Page 11.933.6Results and AnalysisIn this section, we report findings from the study using 29 chemical engineering seniors.So that

Conference Session

Curricula of the Past, Present, and Future

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Thomas Litzinger, Pennsylvania State University; Robert Pangborn, Pennsylvania State University; David Wormley, Pennsylvania State University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

, Page 11.3.10Proceedings of the 1996 Frontiers in Education Conference, Salt Lake City, UT.15 Liz Kisenwether and Jack Matson, Launching An Undergraduate Engineering Entrepreneurship Program,Proceedings of the ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition, Montreal, Quebec. (2002)16 T.W.Simpson, D.J.Medeiros, S.Joshi, A.Lehtihet, R.A.Wysk, G.R.Pierce and T.A.Litzinger, IME Inc.- A NewCourse for Integrating Design, Manufacturing and Production into the Engineering Curriculum, InternationalJournal of Engineering Education, Vol. 20, No. 5, 2004, pp.17 Thomas Litzinger, Martin Trethewey, John Gardner, Integrated Design, Experimentation, Analysis and Life Skills(IDEALS) Courses, Proceedings of the ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition, Albuquerque, NM

Conference Session

Assessment

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

David Meyer, Purdue University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

wide variety of peripherals integrated into a contemporary microcontroller (j,k).Subsequent curriculum changes (specifically, increased emphasis on embedded system design)prompted revision of the course learning outcomes as follows: 1. an ability to write programs for a computer in assembly language (e,k); 2. an ability to interface a microprocessor to various devices (a,c,e,k); 3. an ability to effectively utilize the wide variety of peripherals integrated into a contemporary microcontroller (j,k); and 4. an ability to design and implement a microcontroller-based system (a,c,e,j,k).Currently, in-lab “practical exams” are used to assess outcomes 1-3, while an embedded systemdesign “mini-project” (implementation of a turn-key

Conference Session

Assessment

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Lisa McNair, Virginia Tech; Tamara Knott, Virginia Tech; Mary Leigh Wolfe, Virginia Tech; Marie Paretti, Virginia Tech

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

full range of academic goals that include assessment, advising, careerplanning, core-curriculum integration, and student-directed learning. In addition, while theprofessional skills outlined by ABET are intended specifically for engineering programs, theissues identified by ABET in fact apply to most, if not all, disciplines at the university. Page 11.390.2Assessment of student outcomes involves two key components—the definition of concrete,measurable outcomes and the development of methods and tools for assessing those outcomes.The first part of this paper describes a theoretical framework used to develop measurableoutcomes, illustrated with

Conference Session

Innovative Classroom Techniques

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Todd Johnson, Washington State University; Reid Miller, Washington State University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

20, andstudent retention21. According to Tinto22, the classroom may be the only place where staff andstudents actually meet, therefore, if social and academic integration or involvement is to occur, itmust occur in the classroom, and the outcomes will have an effect on retention.Forming a sense of community, where people feel they will be treated sympathetically by theirfellows, seems to be a necessary first step for collaborative learning. Wegerif23 found thatwithout a feeling of community, people are on their own, likely to be anxious, defensive andunwilling to take the risks involved in learning (p. 48). However, according to Bess, Fisher,Sonn, and Bishop24 those researchers in the field of sense of community have found the construct

Conference Session

Knowing Our Students II

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Joachim Walther, University of Queensland; David Radcliffe, University of Queensland

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

event techniques to compare Page 11.557.6the traits of superior and average performers and derive job-specific competency profiles22, 23.Due to the specific nature of those competency studies the degree to which they can betransferred into a general educational context is very limited. The approach of determiningcompetency requirements in education and curriculum design is best described as an expert’spanel method23, 26. Stakeholders from universities, the profession, industry and the largercommunity define competencies or attributes as desired educational outcomes1, 2. Thisprocedure poses two risks: Even though the participants might have

Conference Session

Factors Affecting Student Performance

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Daria Kotys-Schwartz, University of Colorado-Boulder; Lawrence Carlson, University of Colorado-Boulder; Derek Reamon, University of Colorado

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

) resources do not always allow for TA’s to serve as collaborative assistants in theclassroom, which could alleviate faculty personality or language issues. Nevertheless, the authorsfervently wanted to expose their colleagues to best practices in active learning that couldtranscend the curriculum. Our belief is that unique contextual research performed at ouruniversity would present persuasive evidence that would encourage broad implementation ofactive learning methods. In an attempt to answer valuable questions posed by faculty, theresearch team (the authors) decided to investigate the following: • What level of instructional interactivity in the classroom most effectively promotes student learning: high-level interactivity, mid-level

Conference Session

Knowing Our Students II

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jennifer Turns, University of Washington; Steve Lappenbusch, University of Washington

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

society, the profession of engineering as a whole andperhaps most difficult, their own places in both their discipline and their profession. As acommunity, we need to develop innovative pedagogies to support all of these aspects of studentdevelopment and to understand the impacts of such pedagogies.In our work, we are exploring student construction of professional portfolios as one suchpedagogical intervention1-2. In these portfolios, students describe their preparedness forengineering practice and provide evidence of their preparedness by drawing on experiences fromacross their curriculum. These portfolios include an overarching professional statement, artifactsillustrating their engineering skills and abilities (e.g. circuit design) and

Conference Session

ERM Potpourri

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Barbara Lovitts, National Academy of Engineering; Norman Fortenberry, National Academy of Engineering

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

papers that assert (or sought) determination of an educational outcome as a result of adefined intervention. This paper thus presents the results of the scholarship of synthesis ratherthan the results of the scholarship of discovery. Indeed, the articles we analyze and the metricswe have developed are based on a synthesis of characteristics.The PR2OVE-IT database is intended to be a tool for translating education research results intopractical classroom use by engineering faculty who are not engaged in educational research. Assuch, the website divided into five major categories for searching and viewing information aboutarticles: interventions (instructional practices), subject/content area (content or context of thelearning environment), study

Conference Session

Building Communities for Engineering Education Research

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robin Adams, Purdue University; Philip Bell, University of Washington; Cheryl Allendoerfer, University of Washington; Helen Chen, Stanford University; Larry Leifer, Stanford University; Lorraine Fleming, Howard University; Bayta Maring, University of Washington; Dawn Williams, Howard University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

concentrated on understanding design knowing and learning (particularly iterative cycles in design), multidisciplinary thinking, building capacity in engineering education research, and strategies for connecting research and practice.Cheryl Allendoerfer, University of Washington Cheryl Allendoerfer is a research scientist at the Center for the Advancement of Engineering Education at the University of Washington. She holds an MA in cultural anthropology and a PhD in curriculum and instruction from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Her research areas include ethnic identity construction, second language acquisition, and qualitative studies of engineering education.Philip Bell, University of

Conference Session

Student Teams and Design Skills

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Tamara Moore, Purdue University; Heidi Diefes-Dux, Purdue University; P.K. Imbrie, Purdue University

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

2006-1442: THE QUALITY OF SOLUTIONS TO OPEN-ENDED PROBLEMSOLVING ACTIVITIES AND ITS RELATION TO FIRST-YEAR STUDENT TEAMEFFECTIVENESSTamara Moore, Purdue University Tamara Moore is a doctoral student in Engineering Education at Purdue University. She received both her B.S. in Mathematics/Mathematics Education and M.S. in Mathematics Education from Purdue University in 1996 and 2001, respectively. Before pursuing her doctorate, Tamara taught high school mathematics for seven years. Her research interests include curriculum development, the learning of complex problem-solving, teamwork, integration of engineering into the K-12 classroom, and operations research.Heidi Diefes-Dux, Purdue University

Conference Session

Assessment

Collection

2006 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Joanne Mathews, Illinois Institute of Technology; Daniel Ferguson, Illinois Institute of Technology; Margaret Huyck, Illinois Institute of Technology; Abhinav Pamulaparthy, Illinois Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

that the training sessions were an effective supplemental methodfor teaching the Learning Objectives knowledge. LO training is recommended to continue to beused and expanded if possible to more, if not all, IPRO teams.Hypothesis about overlapping content have been suggested by several sources and therefore it isbelieved that differentiated test scores will be found. Unfortunately, no evidence exists as shownin Tables 6 or 7, so far, that any major or curriculum covers the full LO content of an IPROcourse. Significant gains in a semester are demonstrated in acquisition of project managementknowledge regardless of year or major at least in this first semester of testing but these gains aredue to a poor test instrument BOS Fall 2005 not actual