Chapman, E. A., & Wultsch, E. M., & DeWaters, J., & Moosbrugger, J. C., & Turner, P. R., & Ramsdell, M. W., & Jaspersohn, R. P. (2015, June), Innovating Engineering Curriculum for First-year Retention  Paper presented at 2015 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Seattle, Washington. 10.18260/p.24304

\bibitem{asee_peer_24304}
  Chapman, E. A., \& Wultsch, E. M., \& DeWaters, J., \& Moosbrugger, J. C., \& Turner, P. R., \& Ramsdell, M. W., \& Jaspersohn, R. P. (2015, June), \emph{Innovating Engineering Curriculum for First-year Retention}
  Paper presented at 2015 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Seattle, Washington.
  10.18260/p.24304

Elisabeth A. Chapman, Elisabeth Maria Wultsch, Jan DeWaters, John C. Moosbrugger, Peter R Turner, Michael  W.  Ramsdell, and Robert Prout Jaspersohn.  "Innovating Engineering Curriculum for First-year Retention".  2015 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Seattle, Washington, 2015, June.  ASEE Conferences, 2015.  https://peer.asee.org/24304 Internet.  15 Jan, 2025

\bibitem{asee_peer_24304}
  Elisabeth A. Chapman, Elisabeth Maria Wultsch, Jan DeWaters, John C. Moosbrugger, Peter R Turner, Michael  W.  Ramsdell, and Robert Prout Jaspersohn.
  "Innovating Engineering Curriculum for First-year Retention".
  \emph{2015 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition, Seattle, Washington, 2015, June}.
  ASEE Conferences, 2015.
  https://peer.asee.org/24304 Internet.  15 Jan, 2025

@INPROCEEDINGS{asee_peer_24304
author = "Elisabeth A. Chapman, Elisabeth Maria Wultsch, Jan DeWaters, John C. Moosbrugger, Peter R Turner, Michael  W.  Ramsdell, and Robert Prout Jaspersohn"
title = "Innovating Engineering Curriculum for First-year Retention"
booktitle = "2015 ASEE Annual Conference \& Exposition"
year = "2015"
month = "June"
address = "Seattle, Washington"
publisher = "ASEE Conferences"
note = {https://peer.asee.org/24304}
number = {10.18260/p.24304}
}

TY  - CPAPER
AB  -           Innovating Engineering Curriculum for First-Year RetentionWhile ABET (Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology, Inc.,) specifically requiresthat engineers “meet a general education component that complements the technical content ofthe curriculum and is consistent with the program and institution objectives,” ABET alsosuggests a particular responsibility for engineers to study the social context of technology. In thespring of 2011, this small, technologically-focused research university introduced a course (onesection only) centered about the complex relationships among engineering, technology, andsociety as the first ‘prong’ of a two-pronged effort to modernize the engineering curriculum; thiseffort was then merged into a university effort to improve retention and engagement. While theprimary goal of this course is the engagement of first-year engineering (FYE) students withengineering faculty and the field of engineering in general, it also provides non-majors withexposure to the engineering profession. The course both satisfies general curriculumrequirements for engineering and non-engineering majors and offers engineering majors earlyexposure to key concepts relevant to several ABET Criteria. The second ‘prong’ of modernizingthe curriculum and improving the retention of FYE students was to move from a completelycommon first year curriculum to a first-year curriculum that offers two paths in order to increasethe chances of student success. The “second” path provides an alternative in the fall semester forselected FYE students not to take Physics 1 in parallel with Calculus 1; instead, studentsidentified through mathematics and physics proficiency test scores are enrolled in the new coursein the fall and Physics 1 in the spring. Beginning this year, the ‘new’ course has been maderequired for all FYE students (i.e. adopted by all engineering departments), and in response,eight closely coordinated sections of the course are being offered each semester with a typicalmakeup of 25 FYE students and 5 non-majors. University retention data show an improvementin the retention rate for FYE students to 93.8% in 2013/2014 from 86.5% in 2010/11. Further, in2013/14, the retention rate for first-year engineering students exceeded the university retentionrate of 92.2%.In the context of “engagement” as much as “retention,” significant changes are being made to the‘new’ course curriculum to increase the active learning opportunities offered to the students aswell as to link the various elements of the course (e.g., class activities, team-based designproject, and summative assessments) to the engineering challenges facing engineers and societytoday. This paper will emphasize innovations being made across the course topics in an effort toprovide the students with the opportunity to apply the book-based course content tocontemporary problems through 1) the careful design of integrated out-of-class assignments andin-class activities that build to 2) creatively-crafted formative and summative assessments.The course begins with an exposure to the history of engineering, an overview of the engineeringdesign process, and an introduction to the challenges facing engineers today (via the NAE GrandChallenges). One of the first course innovations was to link each (necessarily simple) designproject by theme to one of the NAE Grand Challenges (e.g., make solar energy economical) orother significant societal problem. Each semester, multi-disciplinary student design teams areassigned a design project in which they design, build, test, and demonstrate a prototype, thenpresent the process and test results. This segues to the topics of engineering ethics and ethicalproblem solving in the context of engineering decision-making (e.g., applying Codes of Ethicsand ethical theories) through a mix of textbook case studies (e.g., space shuttle Challenger andUnion Carbide, Bhopal, India) and more open-ended real-world problems.The course continues with extensive readings on and discussions of the role of engineering insociety and the challenges of developing and managing modern complex technologies that offerthe potential for both huge benefits to society and considerable, often unpredicted risk (i.e.,technological Faustian Bargain). Frequently, case studies are revisited and viewed from differentperspectives. For example, the Challenger is revisited in the context of both design decisions andthe challenges organizations face in managing modern complex technology; non-textbookexamples also are introduced (e.g., Deepwater Horizon). The impact of nontechnical factors ontechnical decisions, the role and influence of the public on the path of a developing technology,and design approaches for complex technology that minimize the inherent risk (e.g., redesign ofthe CFC industry following discovery of the hole in the ozone layer) also are explored.The objective is to demonstrate that the students are not only meeting expectations for the coursebut also for several key “ABET Criterion 3. Student Outcomes” through the exploration andstudy of real-world engineering and technological problems. The course addresses ABET criteria(c), (d), (f), (g), (h), and (j). Assessment results will be presented for (c), (f), and (j), which areemphasized in the course.References:"ABET's Engineering Criteria 2000 and Engineering Ethics: Where Do We Go From Here?"Online Ethics Center for Engineering 6/26/2006. National Academy of Engineering. Accessed:Sunday, October 19, 2014 www.onlineethics.org/Education/instructessays/herkert2.aspx"Criteria for Accrediting Engineering Programs, 2014 - 2015." ABET. 10/26/13. ABET. Web. 19Oct. 2014. http://www.abet.org/eac-criteria-2014-2015/Geselowitz, Michael, and John Vardalas. Proc. of 2011 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition,Liberal Education Revisited: Five Historical Perspectives. ASEE Conference ProceedingsSearch. ASEE. Web. 19 Oct. 2014.http://www.asee.org/search/proceedings?utf8=%E2%9C%93&fields%5B%5D=author&search=Michael+Geselowitz&commit=Search .
AU  - Elisabeth A. Chapman
AU  - Elisabeth Maria Wultsch
AU  - Jan DeWaters
AU  - John C. Moosbrugger
AU  - Peter R Turner
AU  - Michael  W.  Ramsdell
AU  - Robert Prout Jaspersohn
CY  - Seattle, Washington
DA  - 2015/06/14
PB  - ASEE Conferences
TI  - Innovating Engineering Curriculum for First-year Retention
UR  - https://peer.asee.org/24304
DO  - 10.18260/p.24304
ER  -