Conference Session

First-Year Programs: Peer Mentoring

Collection

2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Noah Salzman, Boise State University; Ann E. Delaney, Boise State University; Catherine Rose Bates; Donna C. Llewellyn, Boise State University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

, she collaborates with the Institute for STEM and Diversity Initiatives at Boise State to organize the RAISE summer program (Recreation and Academics In a Summer Experience) for incoming first-year STEM students. She also teaches courses for first-year engineering students. Ann graduated with her Masters in Materials Science and Engineering with an interdisciplinary emphasis in Public Policy and Administration from Boise State University in 2016.Mrs. Catherine Rose Bates Catherine Bates received a bachelor’s degree in Women’s Studies and Creative Writing from Florida State University and a Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing with an emphasis in fiction from Arizona State University. She serves as the Program

Conference Session

Design, Assessment, and Redesign of Writing Instruction for Engineers

Collection

2018 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John Y. Yoritomo, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Nicole Turnipseed, University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign; S. Lance Cooper, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Celia Mathews Elliott, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; John R. Gallagher, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; John S. Popovics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Paul Prior, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Julie L Zilles, University of Illinois Urbana Champaign

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society

is a matter of quite specific genres rather than of general skills and broad academic ordisciplinary styles; and iii) writing is a way to understand and remember technical material andengage in critical thinking (writing-to-learn) rather than just a means of communication. Theseprinciples can be integrated into technical courses using a variety of evidence-based bestpractices.The writing process can be modeled by using scaffolded assignments [22]–[27] and byemploying effective response systems for providing feedback and guiding revision [28]–[30],including peer evaluation [31], [32]. Effective response strategies foster dialogue with studentwriters, providing them with a small number of high-priority, focused points and highlightingspecific

Conference Session

FPD 4: Peers and Perceptions

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Sudhir Kaul, Western Carolina University; Robert D. Adams, Western Carolina University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

-assessment.It is important to note that outcome III has a performance indicator of 63 (Table 5), considerablylower than the indicator for all other outcomes, and also well below the established limit of 75. Asample of the student self-assessment for this outcome can be seen in Fig. 1 (for survey question# 4), 27% of the students feel that they did not improve their written communication skills. Theaggregate for outcome III in Table 4 yields the highest mean and the highest COV, bothindicative of student dissatisfaction with the achievement of this outcome. This could beattributed to the fact that students were only required to write three status reports and two projectreports for this course, and that each of these reports was a group activity. It is

Conference Session

First-Year Programs: Peer Mentoring

Collection

2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Leila Keyvani Someh, Northeastern University; Brian Patrick O'Connell, Northeastern University; Kathryn Schulte Grahame, Northeastern University; Jake Levi, Northeastern University; Whitney Elise Hansberry; Vishrudan Swami

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

your mentor?’ question is summarized in Figure 1. In thisquestion, the students who answered ‘yes’ were prompted to write down their peer-mentor’sname. Due to the diverse nature of our student population and peer-mentors, all of the resultsfrom this section with or without proper spelling of the peer-mentors’ names were consideredvalid. Those who did not remember their peer-mentor were given a list of names to pick from ina follow up question. Figure 1 only illustrates the results for the ‘Do you remember yourmentor?’ question without prompting to choose a name from a list. (a) (b) Figure 1: Percentage of the students remembered their peer-mentor’s name - TA or

Conference Session

FPD5 - Teaming and Peer Performance

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Arlisa Labrie Richardson, Arizona State University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

you how to use the….”Discouraging verbal statements directed to team members would not promote the involvementwith tinkering tasks. Such statements could be implicit and include redirecting team members tonon-tinkering tasks such as gathering materials’ taking notes, writing reports and completingwritten assignments. Verbal discouragement may be very explicit and include the followingstatements: “You can’t operate that equipment” “You don’t know what you’re doing” “You’re taking too long to ….”For the modeling category, the participant’s observation of the team member must be a directand attentive observation and does not include casual glances. The modeling can be either ofsuccessful completion or failure to complete tinkering tasks

Conference Session

Potpurri Design in Engineering Education

Collection

2004 Annual Conference

Authors

Clifton Johnston; Diane Douglas

Session 3425 Writing in the Engineering Design Lab: How Problem Based Learning provides a Context for Student Writing D.M. Douglas, C.R. Johnston, D.J. Caswell, M. Eggermont Faculty of Engineering University of CalgaryAbstractIt is the experience of most writing instructors that when students write (or speak) aboutsubjects that matter to them many writing problems, such as grammar and poororganization, fall away. Since the quality of student writing seems to be dependant on thewriting context, it is worthwhile looking at the situations in which we ask students

Conference Session

First-Year Programs: Peer Mentoring

Collection

2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Lakshmy Mohandas, Purdue University; Nathan Mentzer, Purdue University; Aparajita Jaiswal, Purdue University; Shawn Farrington, Purdue University

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

across students and across sections.Qualitative data suggest four themes of highly effective UGTAs: they are easy to interact with,they are qualified, they immerse themselves in the work of their peers and they are overtlycollegial with the instructor of the course.KeywordsUndergraduate Teaching Assistant, First Year Student Learning Experience, Active Learning,Design ThinkingIntroductionResearch suggests that undergraduate teaching assistants are considered valuable to theinstructors and students. Deploying UGTAs in undergraduate classrooms motivates students andhas been shown to increase student grades [1]. According to Filz and Gurung [2], UGTAs assistwith many in-class activities such as taking attendance and tutoring students, answering

Conference Session

FPD 4: Peers and Perceptions

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Joseph Pow, Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science, RIT; María Helguera, Rochester Institute of Technology; Elizabeth Pieri, Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science, Rochester Institute of Technology; Sadie Wolters; Michael Glynn Augspurger, Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science, Rochester Institute of Technology; Briana A. Neuberger, Chester F. Carlson Center for Imaging Science, Rochester Institute of Technology; Victoria Scholl, Rochester Institute of Technology; Elizabeth Bondi, Rochester Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

First-Year Programs

could do to improve their performance. By the end of the yearthere were almost none.6. When providing written comments, the rater almost always talk about the ratee, and virtually Page 24.1252.11never talk to the ratee. This was an interesting observation. Although the students all knew thepurpose of the peer evaluation was to give some of their classmates feedback about theirperformance, the comments were virtually always written as if the rater was communicating withtheir instructor, and not their classmate. So rather than writing, for example, “you could havedone a better job preparing for the design review,” almost all raters would have

Conference Session

Integrating Experiential Learning into the Curriculum

Collection

2018 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Amy Hodges, Texas A&M University at Qatar; Yasser M. Al Hamidi, Texas A&M University at Qatar

Tagged Divisions

Cooperative and Experiential Education

project.Many of the ideas presented by the students had strong potential for future development due tobeing effective solutions to challenges in many vital fields. By producing the first prototypes,students had an opportunity to understand the engineering challenges they may have to overcometo have fully functional prototypes if they decided to take their idea further.Building the prototype is a crucial first step to convince investors, customers and peers tointroduce, design and iterate products before being released to the markets. Having severaliterations is vital to get customers’ feedback and analyze strengths and weaknesses of the design.The collaboration between the writing course and EEP enabled the students to have a quickintroduction into

Conference Session

WIP It! Faculty Development Style!

Collection

2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Lisa Bosman, Purdue University-Main Campus, West Lafayette (College of Engineering); Erin J. McCave, University of Houston; Molly H Goldstein, University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign; Kelli L. Chelberg, College of Menominee Nation

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Faculty Development Division

College. American c Society for Engineering Education, 2020 WIP: Virtual Writing Group Participation: Surprises & Unintended Outcomes Dr. Lisa B. Bosman, Dr. Erin McCave, Dr. Molly Goldstein, and Dr. Kelli ChelbergIntroduction & BackgroundThis work-in-progress paper emerged from the shared experience of participation in a VirtualWriting Group (VWG) composed of early career engineering education researchers (EER) in avariety of positions at different institutions. In general, this particular group of EERs had limitedresources and access to a peer community at their respective institutions, therefore, the VWGwas formed with the intention to spur EER scholarly activity

Conference Session

Innovations in ECE Education II

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Alyssa Magleby, University of Utah; Cynthia Furse, University of Utah

Tagged Divisions

Electrical and Computer

, Inc., a spin off company commercializing devices to locate intermittent faults on live wires. Dr. Furse is a Fellow of the IEEE. Page 13.832.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2008 LAB REPORT WRITING (AND TEACHING!) MADE EASYAbstractThis paper reports on a project to improve students’ ability to write better lab reports and assistteaching assistants (TAs) in grading reports in a consistent manner. A lab report teaching systemwas developed that includes lab report templates, teaching assistant instructions, grading rubrics,examples, peer review materials and instructions, and recommendations for quickly

Conference Session

Environmental Engineering Division Technical Session 1

Collection

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Veera Gnaneswar Gude P.E., Mississippi State University

Tagged Divisions

Environmental Engineering

and thinking through writing. Exploratory writing exercise involved atopical discussion of stormwater treatment process. A formal writing exercise was given in theform of a stormwater pollution prevention plan (SWPPP) assignment which included a peer–review session prior to final grading. A reflective writing exercise was included to summarizelearning experiences through classroom and writing activities throughout the semester to identifyareas of strengths and weaknesses and accomplishments and pitfalls and areas/topics for futuredevelopment.Student learning experiences and the effectiveness of writing exercises were discussed. Thebenefits of writing exercises were evaluated through the ABET outcomes and a survey andevaluation of students

Conference Session

New Engineering Educators Division Technical Session 2

Collection

2015 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Evelyn C. Brown, East Carolina University; Mary A. Farwell, East Carolina University; Anthony M. Kennedy, East Carolina University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

New Engineering Educators

, Ireland. Page 26.1776.1 c American Society for Engineering Education, 2015 Writing and Implementing Successful S-STEM ProposalsAbstractFor over 10 years, the National Science Foundation (NSF) has been funding S-STEM proposals.The S-STEM program “makes grants to institutions of higher education to support scholarshipsfor academically talented students demonstrating financial need, enabling them to enter theSTEM workforce or STEM graduate school following completion of an associate, baccalaureate,or graduate-level degree in science, technology, engineering or mathematics disciplines1.”Currently

Conference Session

Promoting Communication Skills

Collection

2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Bruce Kovanen, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Ryan Ware, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Megan Mericle, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Nicole Turnipseed, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; J. Patrick Coleman, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Celia Mathews Elliott, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; John S. Popovics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; S. Lance Cooper, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; John R. Gallagher, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Paul Prior, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Julie L. Zilles, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society

-yearintervention project designed to enhance writing in engineering and STEM. The examplesdescribe reflective, writing-to-learn activities for first-year orientation courses; scaffoldedapproaches for laboratory and problem-based-learning classes; and directed peer review andresponse to reviewer comments in middle- and upper-level courses. The paper concludes byaddressing the vital role STEM faculty play in socializing their students into ways of thinking,being, and writing in their disciplines and demonstrates how a process orientation to writinginstruction can help faculty achieve that goal.Section I: IntroductionThe Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) has identified effectivecommunication as a key criterion of engineering

Conference Session

Emerging Trends in Engineering Education

Collection

2004 Annual Conference

Authors

Mya Poe; Dennis Freeman

designed and implemented in acollaboration of technical and writing professionals at MIT, which led to a tight integration of thewriting process with two research projects: an experimental project in a wet lab and a theoreticalstudy using computer simulation. For both projects, students worked in pairs to develop a formalproposal and draft a 10-page scientific paper. After receiving substantial feedback from thetechnical staff, writing staff, and peers, students revised their manuscripts. Comparisons acrossdrafts suggest that peer-review, staff critiques, and the opportunity for revision are all critical tothe educational process. Although written feedback is staff intensive, we have found thatteaching assistants can be taught to provide excellent

Collection

2000 Annual Conference

Authors

John W. Nicklow

to accomplish more than correct surface errors, but to improve the content andreadability of papers. Students were reminded that each paper should do more than summarize thetopic, but rather transform and integrate the subject with their experiences in the classroom. Thechecklist shown in Figure 1 was distributed several weeks prior to the review in order to guidestudents through the peer review process and ensure that adequate consideration would be givento items such as content and organization. Additionally, since the checklist pointed out specificcriteria that ultimately would be used to assess the paper, it became a guide that students could useto write their own papers. Finally, students were asked to expand upon these general criteria

Conference Session

First-Year Activities and Peer Review Strategies in Civil Engineering

Collection

2011 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Katherine Kuder, Seattle University; Nirmala Gnanapragasam, Seattle University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

. Page 22.820.1 c American Society for Engineering Education, 2011 Implementing Peer-Reviews in Civil Engineering LaboratoriesAbstractABET 2009-10 criterion 3 requires that all engineering graduates demonstrate an ability tocommunicate effectively at the time of graduation (criterion g of a-k outcomes). Technicalcommunication is a critical skill for Civil Engineering students to achieve. However,incorporating technical writing in many engineering courses is difficult. At Seattle University,laboratory reports are used to teach technical writing skills. Unfortunately, students often preparetheir reports at the last minute, rather than devoting the time necessary to compose and edit theirwriting. When the

Conference Session

Writing and Communication II: Practical Perspectives on Teaching and Assessment

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Kathleen Jernquist, U.S. Coast Guard Academy; David Godfrey, U.S. Coast Guard Academy; Todd Taylor, U.S. Coast Guard Academy

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

) distill key terms that most professional writersuse to discuss and guide the processes and products of communication for student writers andthemselves. Practice in understanding and applying the terms in various contexts in first-yearcomposition – class discussion, instructor and peer response, consultations with the center’stutors and self-assessment – allows writers to develop a solid foundation with the terms.3 Aswriters progress into their major courses, they appreciate that all writing appeals to an audienceand has a purpose, and these concepts can be adapted to their engineering writing.The charts organize the terms based on the writing and learning processes:3 from larger conceptsof audience, purpose and topic; to formal and structural

Conference Session

Computing Technology Session 1

Collection

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Patricia Carlson, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology; Ryan Smith, Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Computers in Education

compositionprocess in the context of the writing-as-a-way-of-learning movement.2. Evolution of Computer-Mediated Peer Review (CMPR) SystemsDespite proven benefits, integrating effective peer-review into a course requires much effort.Using computers to facilitate the process of peer-review was a logical progression. Early peerresponse systems made use of email exchanges among student reviewers. With digital advancesin the 1990s, CMPR systems – such as MUCH (Many Using and Creating Hypermedia, 1994) –automated allocation of files for review, stored responses, calculated results, and gave access topeer feedback.9 Also, Eschenbach exploited web-enabled software to integrate e-assessment inan engineering design course.10In the 2000s, increasing use of computers

Conference Session

Writing and Portfolios

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jung Oh, Kansas State University-Salina; Judith Collins, Kansas State University-Salina

Tagged Divisions

Educational Research and Methods

common goal to solve a problem, contribute information, and share tools.Students were asked to take the initiative of assigning roles within a team (e.g. a file manager, acommunicator, an editor). The chemistry faculty identified the students from the technicalwriting course who had previously taken the chemistry course and encouraged their contributionsas “knowledgeable peer”/“experienced peer” with their chromatography lab experiences.Technical writing course students wrote summaries of relevant information based on retrievedarticles, and posted the original and the summary to “group files”. Students were to read eachothers work in preparation for planning and building a PowerPoint presentation. The softwareautomatically labeled each uploaded

Conference Session

Writers, Experts, and the Workforce in Civil Engineering

Collection

2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Cara N. Morton P.E, Washington State University; Anna Karin Roo, Washington State University

Tagged Divisions

Civil Engineering

the students wrote theirexecutive summaries. With the submitted summaries, the students were split into small peerreview groups separating students by expertise (ie. students with one type of expertise withinthe field of civil engineering (i.e. structural) would review summaries written by students with adifferent expertise (i.e. water resources)). After the peer review portion of the class period, therewas a whole class discussion regarding the any action that students could take to improve theirsummaries. In the peer review session, students used non-evaluative feedback questions to helpguide their peer review sessions. The three questions came from Elbow’s (1998) non-evaluativesayback process for writing feedback: non-evaluative

Conference Session

Women in Engineering Division Technical Session 7

Collection

2018 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jennifer C Mallette, Boise State University; Harold Ackler P.E., Boise State University

Tagged Topics

Diversity

Tagged Divisions

Women in Engineering

women to engagesocially, evidence suggests that women are more likely to have negative experiences with groupwork [5]. Negative experiences in team settings may cause women to feel less valued, different,and or emphasize the fact that they don’t belong, all factors that can lead to women leavingengineering [5]. Furthermore, women often “report feeling that they must work harder than theirmale peer to get teams to acknowledge the work they’ve done” [5]. In fact, men tend tounderestimate their women peers’ competence and knowledge in the classroom [6] and are likelyto dismiss what they view as female-typical speech acts [5]. Other research suggests that incollege courses, writing specifically is undervalued or invisible when compared to

Conference Session

Assessing Design Course Work

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Rhonda Young, University of Wyoming; April Heaney, University of Wyoming; James Kladianos, Wyoming Department of Transportation

Tagged Divisions

Design in Engineering Education

adviser focused on further approaches to integrating writingprocess and heightening students’ awareness of audience and purpose earlier in the researchprocess. These observations led to the course change described above that assessed draftsections of the report throughout the semester.For the Spring 2009, 1 credit portion of the CDE course three writing assignments are beingadded to the course. The Spring portion of the course was chosen since it is generally lessintensive than the second part of the course, which hopefully allows the students more time toreflect on the writing process. Two of the assignments focus on understanding the content of thewriting and the last assignment is on peer evaluations.The first assignment provides the students

Conference Session

Multidisciplinary Learning and Teaching Experiences

Collection

2021 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access

Authors

Susan J. Ely, University of Southern Indiana; Jotam E. Chen, University of Southern Indiana

Tagged Divisions

Multidisciplinary Engineering

various engineering concepts.The Technical Writing and Experimental Design encourages students to be writers, readers,reviewers and experimenters by providing them feedback at multiple stages of the experimentationand writing process, as well as iterative writing through peer review and grading of multiple paperrevisions. The course was created to follow a modular format, integrating a form of research orexperimentation paired with an appropriate writing or technical communication element, tointegrate both experimentation and documentation within a single module. Each module, learningobjective, and relationship to engineering career expectation is described as follows: • Essay: A formal research paper regarding ethical factors associated with

Conference Session

Innovations in the ChE Laboratory

Collection

2004 Annual Conference

Authors

David Miller; Julia Williams

lives of his students; he also found further supportfor this view in Sageev and Romanowski.1 He began to consult additional sources on thesubject to develop an effective set of strategies to address the problem.Consideration of references on this topic indicated other faculty who were trying toresolve a similar set of root causes.2, 3 The problem lay in finding sources that providedgood models for use in the classroom. Effective models were available from bothLudlow and Newell.4, 5 Both authors, working in the context of chemical engineeringdepartments, addressed student communication problems through the practice of peerreview of student writing. The instructor then set about adapting models for peer review,as well as other writing techniques

Conference Session

Assessment Methods and Learning Pedagogy II

Collection

2011 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Farrokh Attarzadeh, University of Houston; Deniz Gurkan, University of Houston; Mequanint A. Moges, University of Houston; Victor J. Gallardo, University of Houston; Mehrube Mehrubeoglu, Texas A&M University, Corpus Christi; Morteza Sameei, Houston Community College Northeast

Tagged Divisions

Engineering Technology

, aconcept mapping activity was used in order to channel the peer-to-peer interaction towards aframework of knowledge and skills transfer. A concept map is a spatial representation ofconcepts and their interrelationships that is intended to visually represent the structuralknowledge that a learner has stored in long-term memory6-7. The process of building a conceptmap engages the learner with the content and is considered an active learning strategy. A numberof concept mapping software applications are readily available that have also been used for thisproject. By incorporating CMaps with the peer-to-peer mentorship program, we sought to createstudents with increased capacity to engage in real world problem solving, increased writing andoral

Conference Session

CPD Technical Session

Collection

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Alice L. Pawley, Purdue University, West Lafayette; Adam R. Carberry, Arizona State University; Monica E. Cardella, Purdue University, West Lafayette; Maria-Isabel Carnasciali, University of New Haven; Shanna R. Daly, University of Michigan; Jenna L. Gorlewicz, Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville; Geoffrey L. Herman, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign; Morgan M. Hynes, Purdue University, West Lafayette; Shawn S. Jordan, Arizona State University, Polytechnic campus; Nadia N. Kellam, University of Georgia; Micah Lande, Arizona State University, Polytechnic campus; Matthew A. Verleger, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical Univ., Daytona Beach; Dazhi Yang, Boise State University

Tagged Divisions

Continuing Professional Development

opportunity for me to deepen these relationships and gain confidence andaccountability in my work. Since the workshop, I have begun swapping articles and proposalswith several other participants of PEER to give and receive feedback on drafts. I have received Page 24.1237.15candid and honest feedback that has been invaluable. I have also been held accountable to meetmy internal paper deadlines so that I keep writing even when other responsibilities are clamoringfor my attention. I now have twice as many papers in submission than I have ever had prior toPEER. I attribute this level of feedback and accountability to the quality of relationships that

Conference Session

Writing and Communication

Collection

2017 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Necia Werner, Carnegie Mellon University; Suguru Ishizaki, Carnegie Mellon University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education/Engineering & Society

Paper ID #20491Making the Invisible Visible in Writing Classrooms: An Approach to Increas-ing Textual Awareness using Computer-Aided Rhetorical AnalysisNecia Werner, Carnegie Mellon University Dr. Necia Werner is an Assistant Teaching Professor of English and Director of the professional and technical writing programs at Carnegie Mellon University. Werner serves on the advisory committee (AdCom) of the IEEE Professional Communication Society, and as an Associate Editor for the teaching case section of the IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication.Suguru Ishizaki, Carnegie Mellon University Suguru Ishizaki is an

Conference Session

ASEE Multimedia Session

Collection

2003 Annual Conference

Authors

R Wane Schneiter

Session 0000 Writing and Undergraduate Engineers - A Continuing Problem R. Wane Schneiter Virginia Military InstituteIntroductionEssentially any published paper that addresses either the engineering curriculum or deficienciesin the skills of practicing engineers includes conclusions regarding the need to improvecapabilities in written and oral communication.2,9,11,12,13,17 In the Report of the Committee onEvaluation of Engineering Education published in 1955, the Committee considered “insistenceupon the development of a high level of performance in the oral, written

Collection

2001 Annual Conference

Authors

Patricia C. Tempel; Hisham Alnajjar; Beth Richards; Andrea Brick Ader; Ronald Adrezin

desire for engineering students who can think critically and write at an appropriatelevel of literacy. Another area of shared concern is to have students understand the importance—especially in the workplace—of technically sophisticated people who can communicateeffectively, not only with peers but with nonexperts.To begin this effort, faculty from both departments met in a series of summer 1999 workshopsfunded by NSF to discuss course content and develop possible areas of intersection. We had themodel of Integrative Learning Blocks 1 as well as excellent support and training from theUniversity. Over the summer each faculty member developed a list of six desired outcomesshared by both classes. At the end of each course, students would