“Nothing About Us, Without Us:” Co-Designing an Accessible Engineering Education Tool with the Blind and Low Vision (BLV) CommunityAbstractThis paper is submitted under the “Intersection of Design and “X” Research Papers” category.Electronics-based education is essential to different fields of engineering education, includingelectrical, mechanical, and biomedical engineering, as it equips students with technical skill setsto design, build, and test functional hardware devices. However, electronics-based engineeringeducation remains largely inaccessible to learners who are blind or have low-vision (BLV), givenits reliance on primarily visual tasks – from spatially sketching electronic circuits to visuallyanalyzing digital simulation results
, are advised by faculty mentors who become free to explore practice and degree-relatedcontent, are prepared for their senior year and graduation. As shown in Figure 1, we see the criticalthinking that happens inside an advising session, and above the line, the critical thinking goes onoutside of an advising session. A sophomore student is going to likely approach advising in thetraditional way, using their advising session primarily to learn critical pieces of information thatinform their thinking. A more advanced student (juniors and seniors) will already have that criticalfoundation and therefore use their advising relationship more critically.Flipped advising, which requires students to complete their “homework” prior to each meetingwith
education staff and partner organizations, including the Disabilities,Opportunities, Internetworking and Technology (DO-IT) Program which supports students withdisabilities.During the program’s first two years (2012, 2013), recruitment was mainly conducted by Centereducation staff making direct contact to local high schools. In service of the National ScienceFoundation’s broadening participation in STEM initiative9, recruitment strategies were refocusedand realigned for the 2014 session. A partnership was formed with the University of WashingtonMath Science Upward Bound program, a federal TRIO program that serves low-income,potential first generation college students from three local high schools. Recruitment efforts werefocused on these same three
rural locations and did Page 26.973.5homestays in rural communities. They got to both interact with each other and with local ruralNicaraguans. A picture of the Villanova and UNI students at the entrance to a Solar Center inTotogalpa is shown in Figure 1.Figure 1. Villanova and UNI students at the entrance to the Solar Center in Totogalpa, NicaraguaAt the end of the week, a debriefing session was held to discuss the potential projectopportunities that had been uncovered and a total of almost thirty projects were proposed.Another important consequence of this visit was the development of close relationships betweenthe UNI students and the
have developed a set of modules covering ethical, legal, and societal issues in computer science that we have integrated into our yearlong 1senior capstone program. According to other studies , a lack of technical knowledge and sophistication are often seen as barriers to student engagement in ethics courses taught in lowerlevel courses. Thus, one of our reasons for covering ethical considerations at the senior level is to help make ethics more concrete and tangible for students by leveraging their experience and maturity in software development (gained through coursework, internships, and in thinking about their own careers). Further, the approach of integrating ethics modules into
also asked to list thespecific contributions of each teammate. The specific list was included to help them betterestablish their rating by identifying specific items and for the instructor to evaluate theengagement of each evaluator - the assumption is that more engagement results in more details.A weighted score was calculated for each metric, effort and productivity, for each evaluationround. For the calculation the number of responses for a given expectation value was weightedand all were summed. For weights, exceeds = 2, meets = 1, unknown = 0, and below = -1. Forexample, a student who received 1 exceeds, 2 meets, 1 below, and 5 unknown received aweighted score of 0.75 = (1(2) + 2(1) + 5(0) + 1(-1))/9. A general assumption that
Engineering and Science (writing.engr.psu.edu), which receives more than 1 million page downloads each year.Ms. Christine Haas, Engineering Ambassadors Network Christine Haas brings ten years of experience working in marketing and communications with a focus on the science and engineering fields. She’s held positions as the director of marketing for Drexel’s College of Engineering and director of operations for Worcester Polytechnic Institute - Engineering. Now, as CEO of Christine Haas Consulting, LLC, Christine travels around the world teaching courses to scientists and engineers on presentations and technical writing. She has taught clients across gov- ernment, industry and higher education, including Texas Instruments
experimentalparameters with those obtained through theoretical manual calculations, reinforcing theirunderstanding of RGA concepts. These virtual experiments provide an interactive and engagingway for students to bridge theoretical knowledge with practical experimentation.In Class ImplementationThe course met twice a week. Each session dedicated 1 hour to theory and 20 minutes to simulationexercises using Simulink, allowing students to immediately apply concepts covered in lecture. Atthe start of the semester, students were encouraged to collaborate in groups to build familiaritywith the software. Working together allowed students to compare model behavior by applyingdifferent parameters and exploring system dynamics. This structured experimentation
practices relatedto international immersions and fair-trade learning, it partnered with Greene County CareerCenter to develop and facilitate participant pre-departure sessions that included culturalorientation, intercultural competence development sessions, health, safety and travel informationand technical preparation (Hargman, Paris, & Blache-Cohen, 2014; Lough & Toms, 2018).Additionally, Cohorts 2 and 3 participants and program facilitators engaged in the Global UpGlobal Competence Certificate (GCC) online learning opportunity offered through AFSIntercultural Programs (https://afs.org/Certificate) before, during and after the participants’ twoto three-week international or domestic immersion. All the technical preparation was
graduation [1, 2, 3]. In addition, students are experiencingmore anxiety and computer science culture-related challenges like personal obligations, lack ofsense of belonging, in-class confusion, and lack of confidence, even more so when from anunderrepresented group [4]. Given the challenges we see in student populations, the currentresearch on increasing student success, and the rapidly changing nature of computer science andsoftware development technologies, we believe it is time to take an informal approach to formaleducation pedagogy. Computer science students benefit from informal learning environments thatallow them to apply theoretical concepts in practical contexts while building upon their previouslearning experiences [5]. Often, these
GrowingOverall, the engineering occupations are projected to add 136,500 jobs through 2022. They willcontinue to be needed to design, build, test, and improve manufactured products. However,during this time, increasing employment of engineers in service industries, research anddevelopment, and consulting should generate most of the employment growth [1].The 2015 National Science Foundation’s Survey of Graduate Students and Post-doctorates inscience and engineering [2] found that from 2008 to 2013 STEM graduate students in the U.S.who were U.S. citizens or permanent residents rose 3.1%. Of these, 25.8% were Hispanic and7.8% were African-American.“Finding Your Workforce: Latinos in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM)” [3]2015 report found
, 1 USB Host, 1 Mini-USB Client, 1Peripherals 1 10/100 Mbps Ethernet, RPi 10/100 Mbps Ethernet camera connectorThe overwhelming advantage of BBB over RPI is the availability General Purpose I/Os (65) vs.8. This is significant for System Design around it for interfacing transducers and controlelements.The rich interconnectivity offered by BBB vs. RPI along with storage and speed make us selectBBB for our System Design class and is the subject of this paper.BBB Interconnectivity and buses: 3 I2C buses CAN bus SPI bus 4 timers 5 serial ports 65
, engineering technologyIntroduction Monte-Carlo methods have been used in examining nuclear interactions since theManhattan Project. Today, the Los Alamos National Laboratory Monte-Carlo N-Particletransport code (MCNP) is perhaps the most widely used nuclear engineering tool in academiaand industry. For example, the American Nuclear Society (ANS) annual meeting last summerincluded 16 talks having MCNP in their title and a special training session sponsored by theDepartment of Homeland Defense [1]. MCNP allows for 35 source particle types and a varietyof calculations to include flux, dose, heating, criticality, and detector response [2]. Theopportunities for educational use bridge major subjects taught in the Nuclear Engineering (NE
consensus that federal mandates of 120 credit hours for our BS Engineeringstudents coupled with the need for enhanced professional development skills poses significantchallenges for our current methods of education of students at all levels. The Panel presentationsand discussions at the 2015 ASEE Conference underscored these points. 1 We were encouraged bythis session and feel that the conceptual framework offered here may help close the gap identified.Furthermore, the workplace skills identified as necessary revealed opportunities for improvementin the region we serve — www.workreadycommmunities.com. 2 Exhibit 1: Strategic Alliances for Enhanced Experiential Learning Output Metrics for Each Stage
, Page 26.1286.2and how student resistance to topics perceived as “not engineering” can be a positive learningopportunity.IntroductionSustainability has emerged as an acceptable theme in many engineering education contexts overthe past two decades, with an earlier history dating back to the 1960s.1 While environmentalengineering was the logical home for sustainability and has driven a great deal of the movementfor sustainability education in engineering, disciplines like chemical engineering and mechanicalengineering have also risen to the challenge to incorporate sustainability considerations inteaching their discipline to undergraduates.However, definitions of sustainability in engineering have been more technical in nature thandefinitions
recently moved out of the team’s shared office space and wasconsequently absent for many informal but important discussions.Overall, team members were generally consistent in the recognition of the above behaviors withleadership. Recognition of the remaining leadership attribute categories was less consistent, andin some cases marked differences between the two teams emerged.Training & Mentoring behaviors include those directed toward helping team members developrelevant technical and administrative skills that would enable them to accept greaterresponsibility. Items in this group included task-oriented training and coaching, sharing mistakesand lessons learned with the team, and apprenticing students identified as potential leads for thenext
University and the winner of the 2018 FACT2 award for Excellence in Instruction given to one professor from the entire SUNY system. He also received the 2021 Distinguished Teaching Award from the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE) Mid-Atlantic Division. He has been twice elected as a member of the ASME Mechanisms and Robotics committee and served as the Program Chair for the 2014 ASME Mechanisms and Robotics Conference, as the Conference Chair for the 2015 ASME Mechanisms and Robotics Conference and has served as symposium and session chairs for many ASME International Design Engineering Technical Conferences. He was the general Conference Co-Chair for the 2016 ASME International Design Engineering
unstructured conversations. Atthe start of the session, the Provost addressed participants, inviting them to be creative andunconstrained in idea generation. The procedural logistics, organizational structures, fundingneeds, etc. would be handled later by a Faculty Advisory Board (FAB) and the relevant Deans.From this session, programming related to design, innovation, and entrepreneurship emerged asone common area of interest. Bolstering entrepreneurship through curricular partnerships withother schools was viewed as an opportunity for the business school whose strength inentrepreneurship had waned in recent years due to staffing constraints. Following theCurriculum Innovation Day, the Academic Council followed up with all faculty and
-based prepreg manufacturing process on thesmall scale. Prepreg is the term used for a fiber reinforcement that has been pre-impregnatedwith a resin matrix.1 The manufacture of prepreg is of interest for both research and teachingpurposes, although thus far usage of the prepreg treater has not been incorporated intocurriculum.Throughout the development of the treater and its ongoing usage, safety has been of the upmostimportance to the involved students, faculty and staff. The engineering curriculum at WesternWashington University places an emphasis on hands-on technical experiences, yielding researchstudents well prepared to recognize the physical hazards associated with industrial machinery.Students, as well as faculty and staff, have found
innovative solutions to the world’s most difficult problems.Indeed, as reports by both the National Academy of Engineering and ABET have concluded, thechallenges that must be addressed by the next generation of engineers are becoming increasinglycomplex as society continues to grow more interconnected [1-2]. To be effective engineeringleaders in a global workforce, engineers need strong communication skills that will allow themto interact with a wide-ranging audience, including entrepreneurs, policy makers, communityleaders, and the general public—most of whom do not necessarily have a background inengineering, science, and technology.This study explores four specific communication capabilities—writing, creating and deliveringoral presentations
patternsand themes within the interviews. The process yielded a total of 31 codes consisting of 11 maincodes and 20 sub-codes through three rounds of coding review sessions. After all interviewtranscripts were coded, the frequency and coding types were analyzed. Overall, the courses were found to be highly impactful. Many of the trainees generallyreported a strong sense of engineering identity and self-efficacy for their work. Alumni reportedbenefits not only during graduate school but also immediately in their careers. During graduateschool, they report that these courses pair well with more technical courses and that manystudents included their partner surgeon on their thesis committee. These benefits also includewriting skills and shadowing
the learning outcomesassociated with participants associated with this project in particular. Table 1. VTC involvement in Design-and-Build ProjectsProject Title DescriptionRainwater Catchment and Design and installation of two 4,000 gallon rainwater tanks, withSmart Irrigation appropriate transfers, filters and pvc conduit. Develop solar- generated pumping infrastructure for moving water from storage to irrigation and greywater uses regulated by moisture sensors in garden beds supported by wireless data feeds.Solar Tube Design and Luminance testing in the classroom to gauge optimal placement ofInstallation 12 tubular
groups producetheir own codes of ethics, after all, and do not rely on some general moral code applicable acrossevery member of society. But if we want to fully understand the role of engineering in society,we must also recognize that that which appears to require control derives from notions of elite Page 26.1723.5status on the part of code proponents.This is an ontological perspective that somewhat counters Michael Davis’ description ofengineering ethics as representing a moment in which “knowledge moves to action.” 1 We wouldinstead say, following Dewey7 and in hopes of articulating even more aspects of engineeringactivity, that knowledge is
STEM FacultyABSTRACTWomen faculty are underrepresented in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) disciplines.The ADVANCE Institutional Transformation project at a large private technical university (supported byNSF Award No. 1209115), referred to as AdvanceRIT, aims to increase the representation andadvancement of women STEM faculty (which includes social and behavioral sciences, SBS, faculty) byremoving barriers to resources that support career success and by creating new interventions andresources.This paper reports on the development of efforts to activate change for STEM faculty in the form of aninternal grant program, Connect Grants, as part of the AdvanceRIT project. The grants supportleadership and career development for all
Figure 3 was used by the researcher togive an example for each expression of leadership. The researcher then determined from theinterviews when a Maker expressed one of the leadership roles.In their Making, this person:___ 1. Listens to the problems of team members/subordinates. (Mentor)___ 2. Reviews and/or reflects upon project achievements. (Monitor)___ 3. Influences decisions made at higher levels. (Broker)___ 4. Does problem solving in creative, clever ways. (Innovator)___ 5. Clearly defines areas of responsibility for team members/subordinates. (Director)___ 6. Displays a wholehearted commitment to the job/project. (Producer)___ 7. Facilitates consensus building in work-group sessions. (Facilitator)___ 8. Protects continuity in day-to-day
icebreaker” – this was listed 7 times with different wordings “Getting everything ready in the beginning, I was already excited to already get started” – this was listed 3 times in various wordings in regards to camper kit setup “Everything was pretty cool so I don't have anything I don't like” “Noise in the classroom during the imovie session the least” “the E-portfolio system took too long to add stuff” “the hollywood box, I didn't like it because they had to videotape me and I really don't like when people do that” – 3 additional comments were listed in regards to being camera shy “there only 1 week to be here” – this was listed 12 times in varying language/wordings
developers. Both the documents were selected because both came from the sameorganization (Microsoft) and were similar in size and fault density (i.e. 2.72 and 2.42 faults perpage for LAS and PGCS respectively).Experiment Procedure: The experiment steps are described below and shown in Fig.3:Training 1 - Training on inspecting SRS for faults: During this step, students in both classes weretrained by the same instructor during an in-class session of 70 minutes on how to use fault-checklist technique to detect and report different types of faults in SRS in a fault list. During thetraining, students were provided a small subset of requirements for a Gas Station Control System(GSCS) and were asked to find faults which were then discussed in class to
technical support (if any) is available to students during that time? Q5: How do you handle liability issues? Q6: Is yours a 2-year or 4-year institution? Q7: Are there any special issues we should pay attention to?2. ResultsThere were a total of 33 responses received and the results are summarized in Table 1. Therespondents are anonymized by assigning them individual identification numbers rather thanusing personal or institutional names. Not all respondents addressed every question and a blankentry indicates that no response was given to that particular question. Two of the respondents(ID# 5&6) were from the same program and so the corresponding data is aggregated. Onerespondent (ID# 23) did not give direct answers to the
Bridge: Linking Engineeringand Society, two papers highlighted the need to bring experiential learning opportunities toengineering education. Ambrose stated “experiential learning opportunities prompt learningwhen students are put in unfamiliar situations for which they are not prepared and yet must act inorder to get a job done.” [1]. Further, Stephens highlighted the need for diverse skills by stating“Today’s engineers need to be not only technically strong but also creative and able to work wellin teams, communicate effectively, and create products that are useful in the “real world””. [2].In addition, research conducted in two Intensive Innovation Experiences, called Aggies Invent,indicates that over 90% of the student participants agree or
utilized primarily in science education, the significant overlap andapplication of science (and mathematics) in engineering, along with the general applicability ofthe definitions within the model suggest its likely utility for the study of engineering teachers’PCK as well. Indeed, in a recent review of PCK research, [12] tentatively concluded that “themajority of PCK models can be captured by the RCM”.The RCM is a five-layered, concentric, and interconnected model highlighting PCK. Carlson etal. [21] described this model as follows, beginning with ePCK at the center of the concentricmodel and moving outward: 1. Enacted PCK (ePCK)— the unique subset of knowledge that a teacher draws on to engage in pedagogical reasoning while planning