Exploring Knowledge, Skills, Attributes and Technical Learning in a Work-Integrated Learning Engineering Program

Annick Jade Dewald; Sophia Vicente; Hannah Root; Rebecca Holcombe; Sara A. Atwood

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Conference: 2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Publication Date: June 22, 2025
Start Date: June 22, 2025
End Date: August 15, 2025
Conference Session: Cooperative and Experiential Education Division (CEED): Identity, Motivation & Belonging in Experiential Learning
Tagged Division: Cooperative and Experiential Education Division (CEED)
Page Count: 10
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--56514
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/56514
Download Count: 1

Paper Authors

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Annick Jade Dewald Greenway College

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Dr. Annick Dewald is a founding faculty member of Greenway College. She holds an undergraduate engineering degree from Smith College and a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her dissertation research encompassed systems engineering, solar-electric aircraft design, multidisciplinary design optimization, and remote sensing for climate monitoring. Beyond academia, Annick has industry experience at Boeing Research & Technology as well as at Electra.aero, an electric aircraft startup. While working at electra.aero, she expanded upon her dissertation research by leading a team of undergraduate interns to manufacture and flight-test a demonstrator vehicle for the Stratospheric Airborne Climate Observatory System (SACOS). At Greenway College, Annick is integrating her passions for teaching, mentoring, and hands-on engineering experiences to develop and teach Greenway’s reimagined engineering curriculum, which centers sustainability and project-based learning.

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Sophia Vicente Elizabethtown College orcid.org/0000-0002-1670-0664

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Sophia Vicente (she/her) is currently a Postdoctoral Associate with Elizabethtown College and the Greenway Center for Equity and Sustainability. She has over 6 years of experience studying, teaching, and working alongside engineering students and faculty. Sophia is a former Science & Technology Policy Fellow at the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine and with this background, she is passionate about connecting research, practice, and policy. She holds a PhD in Engineering Education and MEng in Industrial and Systems Engineering from Virginia Tech as well as a BS in Industrial Engineering from Penn State.

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Dr. Sara A. Atwood is the Dean of the School of Engineering and Computer Science and Professor of Engineering at Elizabethtown College in Pennsylvania. She holds a BA and MS in Engineering Sciences from Dartmouth College, and PhD in Mecha

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Abstract

A national task force organized by the American Society for Engineering Education and National Academy of Engineering with support from the National Science Foundation recently made a call for change in undergraduate engineering and engineering technology education through the Engineering Mindset Report (2024). In this report, Recommendation 1.5 stated that programs should “Create student-centered paid internship and co-op programs integrated into engineering curricula that encourage, support, and recognize the value of work experiences.” Despite this call and continued calls for experiential learning in engineering, there has been less work dedicated to understanding technical learning during work-integrated cooperative learning experiences. Notably, in a review of the cooperative education literature published in the American Society of Engineering Education only one of almost 100 papers focused on students’ technical learning of statics concepts during a cooperative learning experience. While it is important to emphasize professional skills, it is also important that engineering students graduate with strong technical skills and understanding of how these technical skills will apply in the workforce. Therefore, it is critical to explore students’ perception of technical learning in the broader context of work-integrated learning.

The purpose of this work-in-progress paper is to explore students' perceptions of technical knowledge, skills, and attributes at the beginning of an innovative work-integrated learning program. This work-in-progress focuses on semi-structured interviews conducted with six students using the lens of the Knowledge, Skills, and Attributes (KSA) conceptual framework to explore students’ perceptions of technical learning. To explore students’ experiences in this program, we focused on the following research questions: 1) How do students describe their technical knowledge, skills, and attitudes during work-integrated learning? 2) What context do students draw from when they identify technical, knowledge, and attributes (KSAs)?

The preliminary results demonstrate that measuring technical learning in a work-integrated learning context adds additional complexity compared to traditional measurement and assessment of learning in the classroom context. Despite this complexity for students and researchers, students felt that they were doing both technical and professional learning at work. Students felt that work-integrated learning was more applied in comparison to their classroom learning. Furthermore, in terms of knowledge, skills, and attitudes, in our preliminary findings students’ were most easily able to identify technical skills at work. This demonstrates the importance of reflection and the role of facilitators, whether faculty or mentors, during work-integrated learning. Overall, our preliminary results demonstrated the need for importance of reflection of technical knowledge, skills, and attributes for engineering students. There is a need for additional research to investigate the underexplored area of technical learning in work-integrated learning and cooperative education environments. Lastly, we call on engineering practitioners and academic leaders to consider reflection on technical learning and the potential benefits of work-integrated learning.

Citation
Format

Dewald, A. J., & Vicente, S., & Root, H., & Holcombe, R., & Atwood, S. A. (2025, June), Exploring Knowledge, Skills, Attributes and Technical Learning in a Work-Integrated Learning Engineering Program Paper presented at 2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition , Montreal, Quebec, Canada . 10.18260/1-2--56514

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - A national task force organized by the American Society for Engineering Education and National Academy of Engineering with support from the National Science Foundation recently made a call for change in undergraduate engineering and engineering technology education through the Engineering Mindset Report (2024). In this report, Recommendation 1.5 stated that programs should “Create student-centered paid internship and co-op programs integrated into engineering curricula that encourage, support, and recognize the value of work experiences.” Despite this call and continued calls for experiential learning in engineering, there has been less work dedicated to understanding technical learning during work-integrated cooperative learning experiences. Notably, in a review of the cooperative education literature published in the American Society of Engineering Education only one of almost 100 papers focused on students’ technical learning of statics concepts during a cooperative learning experience. While it is important to emphasize professional skills, it is also important that engineering students graduate with strong technical skills and understanding of how these technical skills will apply in the workforce. Therefore, it is critical to explore students’ perception of technical learning in the broader context of work-integrated learning. 

The purpose of this work-in-progress paper is to explore students&#39; perceptions of technical knowledge, skills, and attributes at the beginning of an innovative work-integrated learning program. This work-in-progress focuses on semi-structured interviews conducted with six students using the lens of the Knowledge, Skills, and Attributes (KSA) conceptual framework to explore students’ perceptions of technical learning. To explore students’ experiences in this program, we focused on the following research questions:
1) How do students describe their technical knowledge, skills, and attitudes during work-integrated learning? 
2) What context do students draw from when they identify technical, knowledge, and attributes (KSAs)? 

The preliminary results demonstrate that measuring technical learning in a work-integrated learning context adds additional complexity compared to traditional measurement and assessment of learning in the classroom context. Despite this complexity for students and researchers, students felt that they were doing both technical and professional learning at work. Students felt that work-integrated learning was more applied in comparison to their classroom learning. Furthermore, in terms of knowledge, skills, and attitudes, in our preliminary findings students’ were most easily able to identify technical skills at work. This demonstrates the importance of reflection and the role of facilitators, whether faculty or mentors, during work-integrated learning. Overall, our preliminary results demonstrated the need for importance of reflection of technical knowledge, skills, and attributes for engineering students. There is a need for additional research to investigate the underexplored area of technical learning in work-integrated learning and cooperative education environments. Lastly, we call on engineering practitioners and academic leaders to consider reflection on technical learning and the potential benefits of work-integrated learning.
AU  - Annick Jade Dewald
AU  - Sophia Vicente
AU  - Hannah Root
AU  - Rebecca Holcombe
AU  - Sara A. Atwood
CY  - Montreal, Quebec, Canada 
DA  - 2025/06/22
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Exploring Knowledge, Skills, Attributes and Technical Learning in a Work-Integrated Learning Engineering Program 
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/56514
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--56514
ER  -