Conference Session

Approaches to Learning Outcomes Assessment in Liberal Education

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Zhiwei Guan, University of Washington; Jennifer Turns, University of Washington

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

the importanceof the course topics and provided him confidence in his knowledge by forcing him tothink about the course and the connections between the course knowledge andprofessional discipline.The various impacts we found in this study confirm and provide further empirical supportfor findings reported in the literature. For example, we found that portfolio creation couldhelp students have a better understanding of what they learned as in Jalkio 1, take fullownership for their portfolios as in Williams 2002 2, help students enhance their learningas in Christy 1998 3, see the major advantages in keeping a record of achievement as inKnott 20044, feel positive about the value of portfolios for increased awareness ofeducational attainment as in

Conference Session

Liberal Education Division Poster Session

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Daniel Walsh, California Polytechnic State University; Stacey Breitenbach, California Polytechnic State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

nature.1 It demands graduates that are integrative as well asanalytical. Academia must develop programs that are capable of producing graduates who areadept at functional thinking as well as analytical thinking, alumni as capable of integrating andconnecting parts as they are at reductionism. Engineering education must provide exposures thatextend a students desire to develop order into an ability to orchestrate chaos, experience whichpush students beyond a need to create certainty to enable them to develop a tolerance for and anunderstanding of risk and an attendant ability to embrace ambiguity. It requires engineers topractice problem forming as well as solving. It must stress engineering design and the ability torealize products. To be

Conference Session

Liberal Education Division Poster Session

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robert Meyer, Clarkson University; Dick Pratt, Clarkson University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

and engineering. Prior to EC20001, it met the ABET criteriafor course content in the humanities and social sciences.With the introduction of the ABET Engineering Criteria 2000 (EC2000)1 the emphasis oncurricular evaluation shifted from a prescription of topical content to assessment of studentlearning outcomes. As part of EC2000, engineering curricula were required to demonstrate Page 12.1399.2outcomes that went beyond those that might be expected from the traditional distribution ofcourses in the arts and sciences alone. As a way of fulfilling this requirement, we proposed thatgraduation requirements should be based on outcomes, rather than a

Conference Session

Redefining the Boundaries of Engineering and Liberal Education: Contributions to the Year of Dialogue

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

William Grimson, Dublin Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

and their relevance to EngineeringHistorically the five main branches are generally agreed to be Epistemology, Metaphysics,Ethics, Logic, and Aesthetics. The contention is that by careful reflection on what constitutesengineering from the perspective of each of the above five branches, something definitiveemerges about ‘engineering’: in effect the branches are the ‘microscopes/telescopes’ that areused to examine and observe the subject.Table 1 summarizes the five branches of philosophy, and provides a simple description of eachbranch, and gives some examples of the categories within each division. It is admitted that the‘question’ that each branch attempts to address has shifted over the centuries but the definitionsgiven in the Table are

Conference Session

Writing and Communication II: Practical Perspectives on Teaching and Assessment

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Luke Niiler; David Beams

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

writing samples gathered inportfolios). It employs several assessment strategies (quantitative analyses of student writingsamples, quantitative analyses of written surveys, and qualitative analyses of interviewtranscripts).BackgroundThe EWI began in 2004 with the our shared sense of frustration over the quality of studentwriting skills in engineering coursework. Unprofessional language, poor grammar and spelling,badly-formatted tables, figures, and graphs, and data reported without any sense of context:these and many other problems were endemic in the UT-Tyler engineering program. Weattempted to address these concerns with the publication of a style guide,1 yet the changesbrought about by that tool were cosmetic, at best. The first year of this

Conference Session

Multidisciplinary and Liberal Education

Collection

2007 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Robert Martello, Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering; Jonathan Stolk, Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

aspects of the Paul Revere integrated courseblock have been designed to provide students with self-directed interdisciplinary projectexperiences (Figure 1). Historical and materials science content is tightly synchronized, andstudents are given primary responsibility for the planning and management of projects and theguiding of classroom discussions. Projects culminate in physical deliverables and written reportsor posters that are co-evaluated by the faculty team.Project Theme and Materials Science Goals and Objectives History of Technology Goals and Objectives Allotted Time • Develop basic laboratory and experimental design skills + Contextual Analysis of the Common

Conference Session

Learning to Communicate with Engineers and Non-Engineers

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Leslie Potter, Iowa State University; John Jackman, Iowa State University; K. Jo Min, Iowa State University; Matthew Search, Iowa State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

. Page 13.71.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2008 A New Engineering Communications Course Based on a Professional Communications ProcessAbstractGiven the nationally recognized need to improve engineering students’ communication skills, anew engineering communication course was developed by the Industrial and ManufacturingSystems Engineering department at Iowa State University and offered in the Fall of 2007. Initialassessment results provide insight into student learning needs related to specific professionalcommunication skills. The course is characterized by a high degree of interaction and formativeassessment of students along with a unique core professional communication process consistingof (1) Analysis

Conference Session

Venturing Out: Service Learning, Study Abroad, and Criterion H

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John Duffy, University of Massachusetts Lowell; Carol Barry, University Massachusetts Lowell; Linda Barrington, University of Massachusetts-Lowell; David Kazmer, University of Massachusetts-Lowell; William Moeller, University of Massachusetts Lowell; Cheryl West, University of Massachusetts Lowell

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

meeting real community needs. In engineering thestudents become better professionals and better citizens while the community benefits. There aremany other definitions in the literature, for example, service-learning is the integration ofacademic subject matter with service to the community in credit-bearing courses, with keyelements including reciprocity, reflection, coaching, and community voice in projects (Jacoby,1996)1. Service-learning (S-L) has been shown to be effective in a large number of cognitiveand affective measures, including critical thinking and tolerance for diversity, and leads to betterknowledge of course subject matter, cooperative learning, recruitment of under-representedgroups in engineering, retention of students, and

Conference Session

Beyond Individual Ethics: Engineering in Context

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Arthur Sacks, Colorado School of Mines

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

Academy of Engineering, The Engineer of 2020: Visions on Engineering In The New Century, Washington, D. C.: The National Academy Press, 2004, pp. 1-82. Page 13.292.13

Conference Session

Beyond Individual Ethics: Engineering in Context

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Donna Riley, Smith College

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

adjusting to new content andmethods.IntroductionAs engineering has established itself as a profession, a defining and essential element ofengineering education is professional ethics. Since 2000, the requirement to include ethics as partof an accredited degree has crystallized.1 However, now that more engineering curricula aretaking ethics seriously, the question of what rightly belongs in an engineer’s ethics education isdeservedly garnering more attention. Herkert2 offers a critique that typically, engineering ethicsis thought of only in terms of “microethics” – the individual decision-making of the engineeringprofessional. He reviews several calls made over the past three decades by scholars ofengineering ethics to incorporate “macroethics

Conference Session

Philosophy of Engineering Education: Epistemology and Ethics

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John Heywood, Trinity College-Dublin

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

of the essay “TheRhythm of Education.” He distinguishes between three stages of mental growth – romance,precision and generalization. “Education should consist in a continual repetition of suchcycles.”53 They may be of a long duration or of a short duration. Thus in the long term thestages shown in exhibit 1 can be related to primary, post-primary and higher education. ButWhitehead would argue that we approach problems however simple or complex in this way. Sounderstanding the stages leads to particular types of curriculum and instruction. There is animmediate lesson for those promoting the teaching of engineering in elementary and post-elementary schooling: that is, that the emphasis should be on the stage of romance. This is notto say that

Conference Session

Philosophy of Engineering Education: Epistemology and Ethics

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

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

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

instrument was adapted from “AssessingGeneral Education: A Questionnaire to Initiate Campus Conversation” by Jack Meacham anddistributed by the American Association of Colleges and Universities. The last question in thesurvey asked faculty to rank the quality of the general education program on a scale from 1 to 5,where 1 was associated with the statement, “Our general education program satisfies the minimalaccreditation requirements.” The score of 5 was associated with the statement, “Our generaleducation program surpasses in quality those of our peer institutions.” With 40 % of the facultyresponding (and 61% of the respondents from the college of arts and sciences), the meanresponse to this question of quality was 2.9, the median was 3.0 and the

Conference Session

Beyond Individual Ethics: Engineering in Context

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Dean Nieusma, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

approaches. The PDI program entails a set ofinterdisciplinary, undergraduate courses and degree options that span engineering, the humanitiesand social sciences (H&SS), design disciplines, and management. Initiated in the mid-1990s,PDI was motivated primarily by the desires 1) to combine the strengths of various disciplinaryapproaches to social problem solving and 2) to revamp undergraduate engineering curricula byincluding systematic analysis of the social context of engineering problems. By beingintegrative, interdisciplinary, and systematically attentive to the social context of engineeringwork, PDI addresses fundamental shortcomings in the H&SS-electives model of traditional

Conference Session

Venturing Out: Service Learning, Study Abroad, and Criterion H

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

David Ollis, North Carolina State University; Anthony Smith, CPE-LYON FRANCE

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

ofboth language and lab instruction by French (i.e., non-US) faculty, in an overseasexperience.CPE Program in French language class and laboratory The CPE 2007 program brochure, summarized in Table 1, highlights the parallelinstruction in French language and laboratory, along with emphasis on the culturalopportunities of the host city Lyon. The original CPE program1 was founded in 2000with a goal of providing US engineering and chemistry students with a summerexperience in France, which could then lead to an enhanced exchange of technicalstudents in subsequent academic semesters. Several of our previous participants havereturned for summer research experiences in Lyon, and one completed her final semesterof a dual French/engineering

Conference Session

Learning to Communicate with Engineers and Non-Engineers

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Laura Wilson, University of CIncinnati; Teresa Cook, University of Cincinnati; Jo Ann Thompson, University of Cincinnati; James Everly, University of Cincinnati

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

thedisciplines. That writing instruction is most effective when given by writing faculty is acommon view in the engineering field; separate faculty members hold different responsibilities,but the effect of a united front is a strong one.1 From the examination of other colleges’experiences, it was clear that the writing faculty would work best teaching alongside theengineering faculty in a shared classroom. This paper explores the relationship between thewriting faculty and the engineering faculty from the beginning of their team-teachingexperiences. As an example, the paper discusses how the Humanities department and theElectrical and Computer Engineering Technology (ECET) department joined forces to create amid-level capstone course with a heavy

Conference Session

Philosophy of Engineering Education: Epistemology and Ethics

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Gayle Ermer, Calvin College

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

of students to theirimportance. Societal issues should also be brought into engineering technical courses asframes for design work. Causes related to human finitude include the limitations of ourpredictive models and the characteristics of modern technology that make catastrophicfailures more likely. Engineering disasters cannot be avoided solely by training engineersto be more ethically responsible. Engineering instructors and students need to be awarethat the nature of the technological systems in North American society and the means bywhich these systems are designed and controlled all contribute to the catastrophicpotential for technological failures.1. IntroductionOn August 1, 2007, evening rush hour traffic in Minneapolis was bumper-to

Conference Session

Learning to Communicate with Engineers and Non-Engineers

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Paul Ross, University of Wisconsin - Madison

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

guidelines for student portfolios have evolved over the last decade as moreprofessional attention has been given to the nature and purpose of a portfolio as part of studentwork in engineering. Key motivators that have improved professionalism in portfolios includeincreased attention to issues of accreditation and ethics and to the requirement of life-longlearning as a professional obligation. These elements of “portfolio thinking” usually reside wellwithin the bounds of engineering education. 1, 10, 12However, as the world becomes more complicated, knowledge and experience beyond thetechnical must be exhibited by an engineering professional. Increased awareness of theimportance of fields outside engineering – those academic subjects usually grouped

Conference Session

Beyond Individual Ethics: Engineering in Context

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Byron Newberry, Baylor University; William Lawson, Texas Tech University; Kathy Austin, Texas Tech University; Greta Gorsuch, Texas Tech University; Thomas Darwin, University of Texas at Austin

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

. Gorsuch, Ed.D. Associate Professor of Applied Linguistics and Second Language Studies, Texas Tech UniversityThomas Darwin, University of Texas at Austin Thomas Darwin, Ph.D. Director, Professional Development & Community Engagement, The Graduate School, The University of Texas at Austin Page 13.372.1© American Society for Engineering Education, 2008 Design of Web-based Professional Ethics Modules to Alleviate Acculturation Barriers for International Graduate Students in EngineeringAbstractThis paper reports on an ongoing National Science Foundation (NSF)-sponsored research andeducation project.1 In recent years

Conference Session

Learning to Communicate with Engineers and Non-Engineers

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Judith Norback, Georgia Institute of Technology; Nicoleta Serban, Georgia Institute of Technology; Nagi Gebraeel, Georgia Institute of Technology; Garlie Forehand, Georgia Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

Lab set up for video review, storyboarding, presentation practice, and feedback.Assessment data focuses on student needs expressed prior to instruction and benefits describedafter instruction, and the value of instructional components. Examples of projects andinstructional materials will be provided so the instruction can be replicated at other institutions.Introduction Over the past decade, multiple studies have indicated the need for better communicationskills for engineers [1-5]. Studies have also identified, more specifically, the importance of oralpresentation skills to the advancement of engineers in the workplace [6,7]. As recently as 2007,students’ definitions of excellence in engineering education included communication

Conference Session

Beyond Individual Ethics: Engineering in Context

Collection

2008 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Kristyn Masters, University of Wisconsin - Madison; Sarah Pfatteicher, University of Wisconsin - Madison

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

, withan overall student population of 40,000, and a sizable College of Engineering consisting ofapproximately 4,500 students. A recent national study listed the UW-Madison as having the 2ndhighest research expenditures of any US college or university, at roughly $830 million over thepast year.1 That amounts to an average of over $400,000 per faculty member in an era whenfunding rates tend to be decreasing. The pressures to continue that achievement – and to producethe high quality research on which such funding depends – are enormous. Thus, while educationis certainly an important component of the university (particularly given its status as a land-grant, public university), it is hardly the only one, and there are many faculty for whom

Conference Session

Engineering Ethics: An Interdisciplinary Endeavor

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Joseph Herkert, Arizona State University Polytechnic; Jameson Wetmore, Arizona State University; Heather Canary, Arizona State University Polytechnic; Karin Ellison, Arizona State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

the world. He recently edited two volumes: Technology & Society: Building Our Sociotechnical Future (MIT Press) and the Yearbook of Nanotechnology in Society, Volume 1: Presenting Futures (Springer).Heather Canary, Arizona State University Polytechnic Heather E. Canary (PhD, Arizona State University, 2007) is assistant professor of communication at Arizona State University. Her primary research areas include organizational communication and family communication in contexts of disability and public policy. She teaches courses across the communication discipline, particularly in organizational and family communication. In her courses, Dr. Canary emphasizes ethical implications of

Conference Session

Engineering Ethics: An Interdisciplinary Endeavor

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Edward Gehringer, North Carolina State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

purpose is to, e.g., accommodate larger attachments than inboxes can holdon the employer's e-mail system? Suppose the employer has a policy (as some universities do)of allowing private use of the employer’s computer equipment, as long as it does not hinderofficial use? How can our students protect their accounts against break-ins? Not only does thiscase raise important privacy issues, it also touches on the issue of separation of work andpersonal life, which all of our students will face as they begin their careers.1. IntroductionWhen someone, allegedly David Kernell [1], hacked into Vice-Presidential candidate SarahPalin’s Yahoo account [2] last September 16, he highlighted a distinction that is rapidly growingin importance in today’s social

Conference Session

Tree-huggers, Diggers, and Queers--Oh my!

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Erin Cech, University of California, San Diego; Tom Waidzunas, University of California, San Diego

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

provided with equality of opportunity to pursue and advance in engineeringcareers”.1; i While this is an important position statement, it is notably missing the humandiversity dimension of “sexual orientation,” ii among other possibilities. Students who identify aslesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB) are enrolled in our engineering colleges, but what are theexperiences of these students? Do they have equality of opportunity within Americanengineering schools?Researchers have made impressive strides in understanding the experiences of women andracial/ethnic minority (REM) engineering students, exposing how cultural biases foster chillyclimates which hinder the success of these students. But the issue of sexual orientation inengineering has yet to be

Conference Session

Critical Thinking and Creative Arts

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Christy Moore, University of Texas, Austin; D'Arcy Randall, University of Texas, Austin; Hillary Hart, University of Texas, Austin

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

unbalanced in the argument.Pathos, Ethos, LogosThe first step in reaching our pedagogical goal to develop students’ critical thinking is to go backto Aristotle. Aristotle’s Rhetoric introduces the concepts of pathos, ethos, and logos as threeessential “modes of persuasion” in verbal argumentation. Pathos refers to the mode by which thewriter/speaker appeals to the emotions of the audience; ethos to the writer’s own credibility;logos to the strength of the argument itself. Today, these modes are usually taught as the threecorners of a “rhetorical triangle”(see Fig. 1), and visual representations are included. Forinstance, in the introductory Engineering Communication lecture, the instructor typicallypresents a rhetorical triangle and illustrates the

Conference Session

Communication and Collaboration

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Michael Alley, Pennsylvania State University; Are Magnus Bruaset, Simula Research Laboratory; Melissa Marshall, Pennsylvania State University; Marianne M. Sundet, Simula Research Laboratory; Sarah Zappe, Pennsylvania State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

in Norway has collaborated with faculty fromPennsylvania State University to pilot a national workshop (given in English) forNorwegian Ph.D. students on communicating scientific research. Funded primarily byNorwegian industries, the 3-day workshop was divided into three segments: (1) makingresearch presentations to a technical audience, (2) writing research papers anddissertations to technical audiences, and (3) making research presentations to generalaudiences. The first two segments, on making research presentations and writing researchdocuments to technical audiences, were based on a workshop series that was developed atnational laboratories in the U.S., taught to more than 1000 professionals and graduatestudents, and formally

Conference Session

Critical Thinking and Creative Arts

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Beth Todd, University of Alabama; Garry Warren, University of Alabama; Susan Burkett, University of Alabama; David Cordes, University of Alabama; Marcus Brown, University of Alabama

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

primaryreasons for the existence of this group. At the same time, faculty members and engineeringprograms can use our reading group to assess ABET criterion 3, outcome j, a knowledge ofcontemporary issues, by making assignments that involve attending and discussing a news articlewith the group. The ability to measure this type of knowledge gain is important. In 2007, astudy involving a small number of senior students in eight different engineering programs foundstudents to be relatively unaware of contemporary issues in their field and unaware of currentglobal concerns 1. Their ability to communicate and participate in discussion without eitherdominating or withdrawing was also a problem.Faculty members are addressing measurement of knowledge of

Conference Session

Critical Thinking and Creative Arts

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Bill Genereux, Kansas State University, Salina; Elena Mangione-Lora, University of Notre Dame

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

simulationsand multiple video projects would likely be more effective. It is interesting to note that the Fall2008 semester Networking 1 class did not choose to complete a video project due to acompletely different classroom dynamic and lack of student interest. Michael Wesch notes: “Students would prefer less technology in the classroom (especially *participatory* technologies that force them to do something other than sit back and memorize material for a regurgitation exercise) 14Looking back, the Networking 1 teacher wonders if he should have pressed the issue hardergiven that the project deals with participatory 21st century literacy and communication skills.While some students may be reluctant to take an active role in their

Conference Session

Liberal Education and Leadership

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Val Hawks, Brigham Young University; John Harb, Brigham Young University; Alan Parkinson, Brigham Young University; Spencer Magleby, Brigham Young University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

comprehensive approach, resulting from this initiative, to define, develop, and implement theteaching of leadership in the context of engineering and technology curricula. After a rationaleexplaining why the college chose an emphasis on leadership, efforts in and selected results of theleadership initiative are documented, including 1) the development of a leadership modelappropriate to engineering and technology education, 2) the definition of specific outcomes andcurricular material related to leadership, and 3) the development of a framework for using themodel and implementing leadership education throughout the college. The implementationstrategy is based on Kolb’s Learning Cycle and takes advantage of college, departmental andexternal resources to

Conference Session

Tree-huggers, Diggers, and Queers--Oh my!

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

George Catalano, State University of New York, Binghamton; Caroline Baillie, Queens University, Kingston

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

modern era as well as new ideas which have justrecently been applied to the professions. In the spirit of the Diggers from the 1960’s, thepresent work offers new ‘frames of reference’ from which you can consider your decisions.The Diggers focused on promoting a new vision of society free from many of the trappingsof private property, materialism and consumerism. Our hope is to offer a new vision ofengineering which takes into account many of the elements of our society and our planetwhich have been historically ignored.As described by NSPE, “engineering ethics is (1) the study of moral issues and decisionsconfronting individuals and organizations involved in engineering and (2) the study ofrelated questions about moral conduct, character, ideals

Conference Session

Engineering Ethics: An Interdisciplinary Endeavor

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

John Brocato, Mississippi State University

Tagged Divisions

Liberal Education

forassessing their performance relative to ABET Program Outcomes (f) (professional ethicalresponsibility) and (g) (effective communication).Case Study 1: The Pendergrass E-mail ExerciseThe beauty of using narrative case studies in educational settings is their finiteness: they createscenarios with a relatively closed set of details wherein students can analyze a realisticprofessional situation as a way of preparing for similar situations in their upcoming careers.Below we discuss one such case study that has proven especially useful.The “Pendergrass Circuits E-mail” exercise (hereafter simply called Pendergrass) provides ashort-story-like narrative that puts students directly into the scenario described in the case itself(first line: “You are an