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Full Paper: Goal-Setting Reflections for First-Year Students

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Conference

2022 First-Year Engineering Experience

Location

East Lansing, Michigan

Publication Date

July 31, 2022

Start Date

July 31, 2022

End Date

August 2, 2022

Conference Session

Technical Session T1B

Tagged Topic

Full Papers

Page Count

7

DOI

10.18260/1-2--42228

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/42228

Download Count

178

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Paper Authors

biography

Charles E. Pierce University of South Carolina

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Dr. Pierce is the Director for Diversity and Inclusion and Associate Professor in the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of South Carolina. He is also the ASEE Campus Representative.

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Abstract

The transition from high school to college is challenging for most students. There is a lot happening during the first semester that make it difficult for them to spend time thinking about and reflecting on their new academic experiences. Yet, this is a critical time for students to learn how to be a good engineering student. In our Introduction to Civil Engineering course, we use a series of journal assignments to provide students with an authentic space for their personal thoughts. The journal is designed on the belief that students need to (1) consider their own expectations for personal learning in their courses; (2) practice establishing and monitoring academic, personal, and/or professional goals; and (3) engage in real and honest self-reflection.

This paper describes and discusses what we have learned from student responses to goal-setting reflection prompts in this course. The assignments represent a small but important piece of the course. Students are expected to complete four reflection responses for 5% of their course grade. Since our institutional LMS is Blackboard, we use its journal function for online submissions. Each response is assessed for completeness in answering all parts of the prompt. We emphasize that there is no right or wrong answer; rather, each response should be unique to each student. The course instructor, not a teaching assistant, reads and grades each submission. Written feedback is included to let students know that their responses have, indeed, been read.

The wording of each prompt is important and has evolved over time. The first prompt focuses on what students know that is relevant to the course, which is designed to learn more about each person’s prior knowledge of and/or experience with engineering. The second prompt asks them to set three specific goals for the course. To that end, we introduce and practice the SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-Bound) model for setting goals. These two assignments are given in the first two weeks of class. The third journal assignment is a progress check on their goals, which occurs at mid-semester. In the final assignment at the end of the semester, students complete a self-evaluation of achievements, or lack thereof, associated with their goals.

Pierce, C. E. (2022, July), Full Paper: Goal-Setting Reflections for First-Year Students Paper presented at 2022 First-Year Engineering Experience, East Lansing, Michigan. 10.18260/1-2--42228

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