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Rubric Development for Technical Reports in Chemical Engineering Unit Operations Laboratory Courses

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Conference

2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Location

Baltimore , Maryland

Publication Date

June 25, 2023

Start Date

June 25, 2023

End Date

June 28, 2023

Conference Session

Chemical Engineering Division (ChED) Technical Session 9: Student Experiences in Laboratory Courses

Tagged Division

Chemical Engineering Division (ChED)

Page Count

14

DOI

10.18260/1-2--44166

Permanent URL

https://peer.asee.org/44166

Download Count

237

Paper Authors

biography

Jennifer R. Brown Montana State University, Bozeman

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Jennifer Brown is an Associate Professor in the Chemical and Biological Engineering Department at Montana State University in Bozeman MT.

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Stephanie G. Wettstein Montana State University, Bozeman

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Stephanie Wettstein is an Assistant Professor in the Chemical and Biological Engineering department at Montana State University in Bozeman, MT. She has been the faculty advisor of the MSU SWE chapter since 2013.

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Douglas J. Hacker University of Utah

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Dr. Hacker is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Educational Psychology and participates in both the Learning Sciences Program and the Reading and Literacy Program.

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Abstract

The purpose of this work was to test the inter-rater reliability (IRR) of a rubric used to grade technical reports in a senior-level chemical engineering laboratory course that has multiple instructors that grade deliverables. The rubric consisted of fifteen constructs that provided students detailed guidance on instructor expectations with respect to the report sections, formatting and technical writing aspects such as audience, context and purpose. Four student reports from previous years were scored using the rubric, and IRR was assessed using a two-way mixed, consistency, average-measures intraclass correlation (ICC) for each construct. Then, the instructors met as a group to discuss their scoring and reasoning. Multiple revisions were made to the rubric based on instructor feedback and constructs rated by ICC as poor. When fair or poor constructs were combined, the ICCs improved. In addition, the overall score construct continued to be rated as excellent, indicating that while different instructors may have variation at the individual construct level, they evaluate the overall quality of the report consistently. A key learning from this process was the importance of the instructor discussion around their reasoning for the scores and the importance of an ‘instructor orientation’ involving discussion and practice using the rubrics in the case of multiple instructors or a change in instructors. The developed rubric has the potential for broad applicability to engineering laboratory courses with technical writing components and could be adapted for alternative styles of technical writing genre.

Brown, J. R., & Wettstein, S. G., & Hacker, D. J. (2023, June), Rubric Development for Technical Reports in Chemical Engineering Unit Operations Laboratory Courses Paper presented at 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland. 10.18260/1-2--44166

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