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Development of Multicourse Undergraduate Learning Communities (MULC) in a Civil Engineering Technology and Construction Management Curriculum

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Conference

2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Location

Indianapolis, Indiana

Publication Date

June 15, 2014

Start Date

June 15, 2014

End Date

June 18, 2014

ISSN

2153-5965

Conference Session

Pedagogical Approaches in Construction Education

Tagged Division

Construction

Page Count

11

Page Numbers

24.428.1 - 24.428.11

DOI

10.18260/1-2--20319

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/20319

Download Count

460

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Paper Authors

author page

Thomas Nicholas II University of North Carolina, Charlotte

author page

Don Chen University of North Carolina, Charlotte

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Abstract

Development of Multicourse Undergraduate Learning Communities (MULC) in a Civil Engineering Technology and Construction Management Curriculum The project based classroom has grown in popularity with the academic community,primarily due to the new generation of students responding poorly to the deductive, or professorcentered classroom. Unfortunately, collaborative work or team assignments are frequentlycompleted by students working independently during the project and combining work near thedue date. This negates the intention of cross team communication and the group approach tosolving problems. Regrettably, this model of team assignments where students workindependently without the intended cross team communication is prevalent on many campusesnationwide. In an effort to effectively engage the new construction management student andprovide a “real life” experience, the authors developed the Multicourse Undergraduate LearningCommunity (MULC). The Multicourse Undergraduate Learning Communities (MULC) project is aninstructional tool that utilizes a “real world” project that engages two or more courses in acurriculum. The project is selected based on its ability to simulate industry team relationships aswell as reinforcing course learning objectives. With MULC projects, students from each courserely on one another for project deliverables, such as a highway design engineer would rely on asurveyor for land data. The MULC project that was implemented utilized two courses: ETCE 2112 ConstructionSurveying and ETCE 4251 Highway Design and Construction. In this structure, the instructordriven project was replaced with a student driven model that simulates industry relationships.The project consisted of the design and layout of an access road for a new traffic pattern oncampus. Each surveying group was paired with a highway design group to complete the project.The highway design teams (senior level) served as the project lead and each surveying team(sophomore level) was required to communicate with their highway design counterparts tocollaboratively complete this project. This paper presents the development of a civil engineeringtechnology/construction management MULC model and the results of the first delivery of aMULC project.

Nicholas, T., & Chen, D. (2014, June), Development of Multicourse Undergraduate Learning Communities (MULC) in a Civil Engineering Technology and Construction Management Curriculum Paper presented at 2014 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Indianapolis, Indiana. 10.18260/1-2--20319

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