Full paper: <Engaging First-Year Engineering Students Through Team-Based Design and Peer Review:  A Service-Learning Approach>

Djedjiga Belfadel; Isaac Macwan; John F Drazan

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Conference: 14th Annual First-Year Engineering Experience (FYEE) Conference
Location: University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee
Publication Date: July 30, 2023
Start Date: July 30, 2023
End Date: August 1, 2023
Conference Session: S6B: Full Papers - One Size Does Not Fit All
Tagged Topic: Full Papers
Page Count: 8
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--44822
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/44822
Download Count: 139

Paper Authors

biography

Djedjiga Belfadel Fairfield University

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Dr. Djedjiga Belfadel is an Associate Professor in the Electrical and Biomedical Engineering Department at Fairfield University in Connecticut. She earned her Ph.D. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Connecticut in 2015. Dr. Belfadel's research focuses on estimation theory, with a particular emphasis on practical applications like drone navigation and target tracking. Her scholarly contributions span various areas, including space-based infrared (IR)/electro-optical (EO) sensors, signal and image processing, machine learning, and big data. In addition to her research endeavors, Dr. Belfadel is dedicated to enhancing engineering education and promoting diversity within the field, particularly for women and underrepresented groups.

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Isaac Macwan Fairfield University orcid.org/0000-0002-6621-7961

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Assistant Professor of Biomedical Engineering at Fairfield University, interested in developing bioelectronic devices through electrospinning and electropolymerization strategies and understanding the bio-nano interface through molecular dynamics.

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John F Drazan Fairfield University

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Abstract

This complete evidence-based practice paper outlines the benefits of incorporating a challenging team design term project informed by service-learning in a first-year engineering course for students majoring in electrical, biomedical, and mechanical engineering, and students who have not declared a major. The course provides core engineering knowledge and competencies in a highly interactive course format where students are active participants in the learning process. Topics include professional skills such as technical writing and presentation, guidelines for professional engineering practice, and career preparation that involve an engineering approach to problem-solving with an emphasis on teamwork, oral and written communication, creativity, coding, and computer-aided design tools. The final term design project is redesigned to provide a service-learning experience to build confidence in the first-year students allowing them to practice their communication skills in an environment in which they can also serve as role models and mentors to visiting local middle school students. Through the formation of teams dedicated to the design process, students learn the systematic approach to problem-solving and gain hands-on experience in implementing their designs. This introductory design experience culminates with a peer review and presentation component, where students explain their design choices to their peers and interact with the community youth through a poster presentation. The teams must design a system that propels a single person (the “operator”) across the length of the university’s swimming pool with a walking or running motion entirely above water. The project is open-ended in the sense that students are allowed to creatively design and fabricate a system that satisfies the requirements. The successful implementation of this team-based project has encouraged pluralistic thinking, enabling students to freely create any working design that meets the task specifications, and more importantly, they are not bound by a commonly encountered right or wrong philosophy. The teams also learned important lessons about the transition from conception to implementation and satisfied one of the most important outcomes of the course, which is learning to work effectively in teams. At the end of the course, each team was assessed on the quality of design and team efficacy. Students developed their professional socialization skills while preparing technical reports, PowerPoint presentations, and poster presentations. On the last day of the program, students also got to experience presenting their group projects in the form of team presentations.

Citation
Format

Belfadel, D., & Macwan, I., & Drazan, J. F. (2023, July), Full paper: <Engaging First-Year Engineering Students Through Team-Based Design and Peer Review: A Service-Learning Approach> Paper presented at 14th Annual First-Year Engineering Experience (FYEE) Conference, University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee. 10.18260/1-2--44822

TY  - CPAPER
AB  - This complete evidence-based practice paper outlines the benefits of incorporating a challenging team design term project informed by service-learning in a first-year engineering course for students majoring in electrical, biomedical, and mechanical engineering, and students who have not declared a major. The course provides core engineering knowledge and competencies in a highly interactive course format where students are active participants in the learning process. Topics include professional skills such as technical writing and presentation, guidelines for professional engineering practice, and career preparation that involve an engineering approach to problem-solving with an emphasis on teamwork, oral and written communication, creativity, coding, and computer-aided design tools. 
The final term design project is redesigned to provide a service-learning experience to build confidence in the first-year students allowing them to practice their communication skills in an environment in which they can also serve as role models and mentors to visiting local middle school students. Through the formation of teams dedicated to the design process, students learn the systematic approach to problem-solving and gain hands-on experience in implementing their designs. 
This introductory design experience culminates with a peer review and presentation component, where students explain their design choices to their peers and interact with the community youth through a poster presentation. The teams must design a system that propels a single person (the “operator”) across the length of the university’s swimming pool with a walking or running motion entirely above water. The project is open-ended in the sense that students are allowed to creatively design and fabricate a system that satisfies the requirements. The successful implementation of this team-based project has encouraged pluralistic thinking, enabling students to freely create any working design that meets the task specifications, and more importantly, they are not bound by a commonly encountered right or wrong philosophy.  
The teams also learned important lessons about the transition from conception to implementation and satisfied one of the most important outcomes of the course, which is learning to work effectively in teams. At the end of the course, each team was assessed on the quality of design and team efficacy. Students developed their professional socialization skills while preparing technical reports, PowerPoint presentations, and poster presentations. On the last day of the program, students also got to experience presenting their group projects in the form of team presentations.

AU  - Djedjiga Belfadel
AU  - Isaac Macwan
AU  - John F Drazan
CY  - University of Tennessee in Knoxville, Tennessee
DA  - 2023/07/30
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Full paper: <Engaging First-Year Engineering Students Through Team-Based Design and Peer Review:  A Service-Learning Approach>
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/44822
DO  - 10.18260/1-2--44822
ER  -