Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 8: Communication and Liberal Education

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Amanda Dawn Hilliard, The Johns Hopkins University

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

Journal to General: Teaching Graduate Engineering Students to Write for All AudiencesAbstract - The Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) identifies “anability to communicate effectively with a range of audiences” as a critical learning outcome forengineering programs. This underscores the importance of engineers learning to articulate theirideas clearly, not only to peers within their field but also to non-specialist audiences. Whilerecently developed generative AI tools offer support for crafting written documents, they are nota substitute for mastering the foundational skills necessary for clear and effective technicalcommunication. Moreover, students frequently find themselves unprepared for the

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 3: Identity, Professionalization, and Belonging II

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Clay Walker, University of Michigan; Mariel Krupansky, University of Michigan; Robin Fowler, University of Michigan; Kenneth M. Alfano, University of Michigan; Colleen Hart, University of Michigan

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

, it is important for me that the AItouches my writing only so much as a peer review will touch, not too much that my ideas willchange.” The idea of using GenAI only in ways that could be reasonably replicated by a humanis something that also comes up in interviews, which we discuss below. What appears to be keyto students’ commentary on the use of GenAI as it relates to writer’s voice is that their creativity,individuality, and humanity is preserved.In summary, survey responses reveal that students are generally confident in their ability to writewell without GenAI and express a preference for doing so, with 90% and 66% of participantsagreeing or strongly agreeing with these respective statements. Qualitative responses furtheremphasize the

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 8: Communication and Liberal Education

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Catherine Woodworth Wong, University of New Hampshire; Cynthia Helen Carlson PE, PhD, Merrimack College

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

notbe clear to the public, or even to a professional outside of the narrowly focused field of theparticular engineer. After graduation, engineers’ writing becomes exponentially more important.Often approval of projects relies on residents’ or clients’ understanding of engineers’ work. Forexample, an engineering firm might design several alternatives for a new road or bridge, but thecommunity may not approve the best design because the engineers were not clear in theirpresentation of the data.The plain language movement arose from the legal field and the need to provide moreunderstandable documents free of legal jargon. It has since been adopted by many other fields,especially public health and other healthcare professions, where understanding

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 9: Collaboration and Community

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jacqueline Rose Tawney, California Institute of Technology; Morgan L Hooper, University of Toronto; Harly Ramsey, University of Southern California; Maria Jose Azcona Baez, California Institute of Technology; Meredith Hooper, California Institute of Technology; Matthew Alexander Langley; Nina Mohebbi, California Institute of Technology; Micah Kalaihi Kushi Nishimoto, California Institute of Technology; Kay T Xia, California Institute of Technology

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

concerns.” He writes that he managed to emerge from this period and started to find “away back into hope and action” by engaging with solarpunk literature and art, which “provides apositive vision for a better future”. With this newfound purpose and energy, Matthew involvedhimself more with causes and groups that he cares about; however, he had not yet talked openlyabout his emergent authentic self with his peers or fellow organizers before the Pilot Course. Heworried that other folks at Caltech wouldn’t share his concerns, might find solarpunk unappealingor unrealizable, or would judge him for being too na¨ıve, impractical, or radical. Overall, he fearedthat this more authentic version of himself would not fit who a Caltech biology grad

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 4: Sociotechnical Integration

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Lydia Wilkinson, University of Toronto; Alan Chong, University of Toronto

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

writing, reading, speaking, and visual communication. He is also the Immediate Past President of the IEEE Professional Communication Society (ProComm), where he has worked on creating opportunities for members of other IEEE societies to receive discipline specific communication training. ©American Society for Engineering Education, 2025 Media(ting) the Socio-technical Divide: a Course Model for Enabling Socio- technical Thinking Using Performance Pedagogies1. IntroductionIntegrative engagement with the humanities enriches an engineering education in instrumentalways, by instructing transdisciplinary competencies that improve a student’s problem-solvingreadiness, and in ways that facilitate

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 5: Decoloniality and Indigenous Knowledges

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jessica N. Tran, University of British Columbia, Vancouver; Jessica Wolf, University of British Columbia, Vancouver; Jillian Seniuk Cicek, University of Manitoba

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

colonialism” [3, p. 19]? As settler engineeringeducation researchers based in the setter colonial nation now called Canada, we write this paperas a process of ‘pausing’ [9] to discuss the tensions we have experienced in ‘Indigenizing’ or‘decolonizing’ efforts in engineering education in our Canadian and American universityinstitutional experiences.We structure this paper as a dialogue between the first two authors, Jess Tran and Jessica Wolf, toreflect on our engineering education experiences, as recent Canadian and Americanundergraduate and current Canadian graduate students. This written dialogue is an artifact of themany dialogues we have engaged in wrestling with these tensions, including severalconversations we had as an author team. We reflect

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 3: Identity, Professionalization, and Belonging II

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Gabriel Van Dyke, Utah State University; Cassandra J McCall, Utah State University; Stephen Secules, Florida International University; Maimuna Begum Kali, Florida International University; Vanessa Tran, Utah State University

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

Learning and Individual Identity using Cognitive Load TheoryAbstractCognitive Load Theory (CLT) is a foundational framework in educational psychology thatexplains how learners process and manage information. As engineering programs face growingchallenges in student retention and engagement, CLT offers an evidence-based approach toenhance learning efficiency. This paper introduces key concepts essential to applying CLTeffectively and proposes a promising research direction for extending its use to also supportgreater inclusion in engineering education. Research shows that students from minoritizedpopulations in engineering experience more stress and anxiety than their peers from dominantgroups. To date, most studies have approached this issue from

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 2: Identity, Professionalization, and Belonging I

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jessica Mary Smith, Colorado School of Mines; Juan C. Lucena, Colorado School of Mines; Junko Munakata Marr, Colorado School of Mines; Jeffrey C Shragge, Colorado School of Mines; Jonah Klemm-Toole, Colorado School of Mines

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

along with. I like to think that I can work for anyone and with anyone after my time playing football at Mines.Students also identified ways that their peers’ FOK contributed to the success of the capstoneproject. One of the welding students both appreciated the potential for the robotic welder to maketheir work more efficient and came to see that “everyone sees things differently and everyonecan bring a good idea to the table.” An MME student emphasized commonality, writing,“Communication between engineers and technicians can be challenging but shouldn’t. We seemto have more in common with each other than not and are working towards common goals justfrom different points of view/contributions.” Another student similarly emphasized

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 5: Decoloniality and Indigenous Knowledges

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Amani A AL-Mqadma, Islamic University of Gaza; Bill Guariento, University of Northumbria; Caroline Burns, Northumbria University; Rachid Khoumikham, Northumbria University Newcastle/ and The University of Essex ; Hatem A Elaydi, Islamic University of Gaza

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

], looked at engineering project-work aimed at improving language skills,combining engineering students in the UK with peers in Gaza, an area which is facingdaunting politico-humanitarian challenges. This research looks again at issues relating to thelanguage of learning and teaching in the UK and Gaza, but this time focuses specifically onthe experiences of female engineering faculty. A ‘Story Circles’ methodology [2] wasadopted, in combination with follow-up focus groups. In these safe spaces, practicessurrounding the use of English in engineering were explored, allowing academics to compareapproaches and experiences. Though the study has been interrupted by the current war,results to date suggest that there are many more similarities than

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 8: Communication and Liberal Education

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John William Lynch, University of Cincinnati; Sheryl A. Sorby, University of Cincinnati; Teri J Murphy, University of Cincinnati; Betsy M. Aller, Western Michigan University

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

traditional and ESL. It may be argued that a stronger focus on semantic andphonemic fluency could support the more typical research and teaching on written and oralcommunication.Potential intersections between spatial and communication skillsSpatial abilities are typically strong in engineering students who succeed, in other words recentengineering graduates are more likely to have strong or excellent spatial skill abilities comparedto their non-engineering peers. One potential reason for the perceived lack of communicationability among engineering students may be related to their strong spatial ability, where studentsmay have a great depth of knowledge about a particular “product,” but find it difficult totransform this knowledge into writing that

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 7: Interdisciplinarity

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Anna Fay Booker, Whatcom Community College; Tyler L Honeycutt, Whatcom Community College; Pat Burnett, Whatcom Community College; Eric Davishahl, Whatcom Community College; Anna Wolff, Whatcom Community College

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

Bay. The mapping component is parttwo of a five-part scaffolded research project that embeds reading, research, and writing skills.During the next several weeks, the history portion of the HMP is dedicated to locating primaryand secondary sources and workshopping those sources. The history instructor works one-on-onewith students to vet sources online, annotating the sources with notes on why, when, and forwhom the source was created. The goal of the research component is for students to practicelocating sources that situate regional topics in their historical context. Sifting through sourcesalso helps students to narrow things down and revise their questions. The practice of knowinghow to ask a good historical question is the first part of

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 1: Critical Reflections on Teaching and Learning

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jenna Tonn, Boston College; Brit Shields, University of Pennsylvania; Ryan Hearty, The Johns Hopkins University; Adelheid Voskuhl, University of Pennsylvania

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

they encounter our choices and those of their peers; and that through thisprocess we hope to inform students how to make their own choices regarding social andtechnological change.IntroductionWe, four engineering educators trained in science and technology studies (STS) and employed atengineering and engineering-adjacent programs, offer in this paper a multi-institutional survey ofpedagogical choices that we have made in the service of sociotechnical integration. Bypedagogical choices we mean an array of decisions in the context of our institutional homes,courses we teach, and student bodies enrolled. We reflect on the commonalities and differencesof introducing sociotechnical material in our disparate contexts, ranging from humanities

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 6: LEES Works in Progress

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Gary P. Halada, Stony Brook University; Lori Scarlatos, Stony Brook University

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

conferences ASEE citations proceedings7. Co-PIs will: use Assessment Participant Exit survey Analysis andan exit survey and of the feedback and interview discussion ofinterview a sampling response to section in the summaries results (amongof participants about be included project report PIs and inprogram in the and in writing)effectiveness program resources for report (and future for future training iteration of the training)III. Results:In all, 38 new participants completed the

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 7: Interdisciplinarity

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Vanessa Tran, Utah State University; Cassandra J McCall, Utah State University; Maimuna Begum Kali, Florida International University

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

refine ideas through observation. Their drawings reveal a cognitive process thatmerged visual thinking with tactile engagement. Later artists, such as Vincent van Gogh andEdvard Munch, engaged in repetitive and expressive mark-making that mirrored their emotionalstates. For them, sketching became a means of reflection and emotional processing. In bothtraditions, the act of drawing or writing by hand created a bridge between physical action andmental focus. This integration of hand movement, attention, and emotion represents an embodiedform of cognition—one that supports clarity, emotional regulation, and creative insight.MethodsTo address our research questions, we identified three sets of keywords and conducted searchesusing IEEE Xplore, SCOPUS

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 4: Sociotechnical Integration

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Mark J. Povinelli, Syracuse University

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 9: Collaboration and Community

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Ahreum Lim, Arizona State University; Emma Frow, Arizona State University

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

meeting room, with moveable chairs and tables, a projector andFigure 1. The Bioengineering, Society & Policy lab at ASU screen, a large white board, and – importantly – a coffee machine and snacks. This space servesmany purposes: project meetings with colleagues and student researchers, a classroom (when classsizes are small), a venue for hosting faculty writing groups, occasionally a space for doing yoga.Having spent 10 years “alongside” BME colleagues [18], Author 2 has had many informal andlong-running conversations about the ups and downs of running a lab. Over the years, somecommon features across PIs and career stages seem

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 8: Communication and Liberal Education

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Shazib Z Vijlee, University of Portland; Stephanie Anne Salomone, University of Portland; Andrew Guest, University of Portland

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

groups showed increased curiosity in Faith & Ethics and Aesthetics & Creativity.While engineering students maintained higher overall curiosity in Science & Problem Solvingcompared to their peers, and non-engineering students showed higher curiosity in Diversity & TheCommon Good, both groups demonstrated similar growth patterns in humanities-oriented domains.This suggests that while students may enter college thinking they are primarily curious aboutspecific disciplinary interests, their intellectual curiosity can expand into new domains during theirfirst semester. 1.8 Non-EGR Students - Start of Term

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 9: Collaboration and Community

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Todd Nicewonger, Virginia Tech; Lisa D. McNair, Virginia Tech

Tagged Topics

Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

addition, one of our primary goals is to support and engage in the co-creation of artifacts,collaborating with participants to transform data into practical tools and resources, such asdesigning homes with diverse stakeholders. This method emphasizes producing tangibleoutcomes that reflect participants’ lived experiences and aspirations. On the other hand,immersive approaches of observing participants’ environments and social realities in real timecapture moments that cannot be reproduced, contrasting with objectivist research paradigmsfocused on replicability (Lederman 2023). The significance of these different orientationstowards research is explained by the anthropologist Rena Lederman who writes: Being with people wherever they actually

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 10: Institutions and Structures

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Laura Wood, University of Michigan; Berenice Alejandra Cabrera, University of Michigan; Hayley N. Nielsen, University of Michigan; Amber N Williams, University of Michigan; Lu Zhou, Tsinghua University; Lisa R. Lattuca, University of Michigan; Grenmarie Agresar, University of Michigan; Shanna R. Daly, University of Michigan; Joi-Lynn Mondisa, University of Michigan; Erika A Mosyjowski, University of Michigan; Steve J. Skerlos, University of Michigan

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Diversity

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

)equity is or can be shaped by current and future engineering work; (d)​Obj. 4: willingness to engage others (e.g., current peers, collaborators, future work colleagues) in discussions of equity in engineering. To teach courses that meet those aims, engineering instructors also need to work towardthose same learning objectives in their own understanding, as well as learn to implement ourframework in their courses. In other words, faculty must work on the same understanding ofequity-centered engineering as students, if they are to cover such ideas in courses, and they mustalso develop equity-mindedness toward the classroom context, given their role as instructors.Ultimately, equity-centered engineering education requires a

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 7: Interdisciplinarity

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Lisa Romkey, University of Toronto; Robert Irish, University of Toronto

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

: Engineering Communication: from principles to practice (with Dr. Peter Eliot Weiss) and Writing in Engineering: a brief guide, both with Oxford University Press. He teaches enginee ©American Society for Engineering Education, 2025 Building Sociotechnical Competencies through an Integration of Engineering Ethics and Science, Technology and Society Studies: A Reflection on Instructional PracticesIntroductionWith the goal of providing engineering students with a solid grounding in sociotechnicalthinking, and an opportunity to explore the complexities of sociotechnical systems, engineeringcurriculum can draw from a combination of engineering ethics and STS (Science, Technologyand Society) studies to offer students

Conference Session

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES) Technical Session 4: Sociotechnical Integration

Collection

2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jeffrey John Hatala, West Texas A&M University; Celeste Arden Riley, Texas A&M University - Kingsville; James K. Nelson Jr. P.E., Texas A&M University System RELLIS Campus; Andrew Steven Crawford, Tarleton State University; Victoria June Vinzant, Texas A&M University - Kingsville; London Knight, West Texas A&M University

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Liberal Education/Engineering & Society Division (LEES)

disciplinesSupporting LiteratureWithin colleges of engineering, a fair amount has been written over the past several decadesabout designing and incorporating interdisciplinary elements [4]. The importance and relevanceof interdisciplinary education and perspectives is gaining traction; the evidence is seen throughample studies in engineering journals and conference proceedings. New courses and programsdiscussed in the conference proceedings arena alone include Waidley and Bittner [5], Cone, et al.[6], Kurtanich, et al. [7], Backer and Bates [8], and Cho, et al. [9]. The peer-reviewed literatureand other conference proceedings offer more and innovative examples of how to includeperspectives, knowledge and skills across engineering curriculum.However, among