Team dynamics and cultural competency in a first-year engineering classroom

Jutshi Agarwal; P.K. Imbrie

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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: Student Teams and Teamwork
Tagged Division: Educational Research and Methods Division (ERM)
Tagged Topic: Diversity
Page Count: 11
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--44434
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/44434
Download Count: 219

Paper Authors

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Jutshi Agarwal University of Cincinnati

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Jutshi Agarwal is a Post Doctoral Fellow with the Department of Engineering and Computng Education at the University of Cincinnati. She has a Doctoral degrree in Engineering Education and a Master's degree in Aerospace Engineering from University of Cincinnati, and a Bachelor's degree in Aerospace Engineering from SRM University, India. Her research areas of interest are graduate student professional development for a career in academia, preparing future faculty, and using AI tools to solve non-traditional problems in engineering education.

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P.K. Imbrie University of Cincinnati

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P.K. Imbrie is the Head and Professor of the Department of Engineering Education and a Professor in the Department of Aerospace Engineering and Engineering Mechanics University of Cincinnati. He received his B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Aerospace Engineering from Texas A&M University. He is an advocate for research-based approaches to engineering education, curricular reform, and student retention. Imbrie conducts both traditional, as well as educational research in experimental mechanics, piezospectroscopic techniques, epistemologies, assessment, and modeling of student learning, student success, student team effectiveness, and global competencies He helped establish the scholarly foundation for engineering education as an academic discipline through lead authorship of the landmark 2006 JEE special reports “The National Engineering Education Research Colloquies” and “The Research Agenda for the New Discipline of Engineering Education.” He has a passion for designing state-of-the-art learning spaces. While at Purdue University, Imbrie co-led the creation of the First-Year Engineering Program’s Ideas to Innovation (i2i) Learning Laboratory, a design-oriented facility that engages students in team-based, socially relevant projects. While at Texas A&M University Imbrie co-led the design of a 525,000 square foot state-of-the-art engineering education focused facility; the largest educational building in the state. His expertise in educational pedagogy, student learning, and teaching has impacted thousands of students at the universities for which he has been associated. Imbrie is nationally recognized for his work in active/collaborative learning pedagogies, teaming and student success modeling. His engineering education leadership has produced fundamental changes in the way students are educated around the world.

Imbrie has been a member of ASEE since 2000 and has been actively involved with the Society in various capacities. He has served in multiple leadership roles in the ERM and FPD divisions, including: ERM board of directors (2002-2004), program chair for ERM (2005 and 2009), ERM program chair for Frontiers in Education (FIE) (2004), FIE Steering Committee ERM representative (2003-2009), as well as program chair (2016) and division chair (2016-17) for FPD. He has also served on two ASEE advisory committees.

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Abstract

This research paper is motivated by the observation that team-based pedagogies are becoming more ubiquitous in engineering classrooms. ABET’s requirement for engineering graduates to demonstrate a capability to work effectively in diverse teams and the industry’s increasing reliance on intra- and inter-departmental teams has contributed significantly to this. In particular, engineers of today are expected to work effectively in global teams with members from different backgrounds including country of origin, race, gender, and first language. In this regard, the ability to discern the similarities and differences between team members and using those to cohesively work together has become crucial. In academic environments too, students face diverse teams as the demographics of engineering colleges evolves to be more inclusive.

When assigning teams in classrooms, evidence has pointed instructors to avoid student-selected teams or random-assignment and rely on criteria-based team assignments instead. Traditionally, instructors have chosen various criteria like academic performance, skills, prior knowledge in the topic area, demographics, personality types, learning preferences, and even schedules to divide students into homogeneous or heterogeneous teams. Lack of cultural competency and awareness, however, can often lead to team dysfunction in academic settings when students face difficulty in interacting with each other due to language and cultural differences. Some studies have retroactively investigated the cultural competency of members in teams formed using traditional criteria. But, the literature shows little to no evidence on the impact of using cultural competency as one of the criteria for creating teams in engineering classrooms. This research attempts to fill this gap and examine team dynamics as a result of this. The research question investigated in this study is: how do team dynamics differ in teams that have been formed to represent homogeneity and heterogeneity in cultural competency respectively, in addition to traditional criteria?

The study is situated in a first-year introductory engineering course at a large, public, midwestern, R1 university with a class size of about 1450 students divided into about 27 sections. Student teams are usually formed in the beginning of the semester based on prior knowledge of programming and computing skills in addition to other demographics. In an experimental design, an additional criterion of cultural competency was added where sections of the course had teams with: homogeneous, heterogeneous, and random (control) cultural competency. Cultural competency was examined using the Miville-Guzman Universality-Diversity Scale short form (M-GUDS-S) which measures a single construct of Universal- diversity orientation (UDO) with three factors. Team dynamics were measured using instruments of team effectiveness at the end of the semester. The paper discusses the evidence of reliability and validity of the self-reported instruments with an analysis of differences in the team dynamics of sections based on homogeneous, heterogeneous, and control group of M-GUDs score. The study discusses the implications of assessing the cultural competencies of students in the context of teamwork in engineering classrooms and how different cultural competencies of students in a team impacts teamwork and in turn student learning.

Citation
Format

Agarwal, J., & Imbrie, P. (2023, June), Team dynamics and cultural competency in a first-year engineering classroom Paper presented at 2023 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition, Baltimore , Maryland. 10.18260/1-2--44434

TY - CPAPER
AB - This research paper is motivated by the observation that team-based pedagogies are becoming more ubiquitous in engineering classrooms. ABET’s requirement for engineering graduates to demonstrate a capability to work effectively in diverse teams and the industry’s increasing reliance on intra- and inter-departmental teams has contributed significantly to this. In particular, engineers of today are expected to work effectively in global teams with members from different backgrounds including country of origin, race, gender, and first language. In this regard, the ability to discern the similarities and differences between team members and using those to cohesively work together has become crucial. In academic environments too, students face diverse teams as the demographics of engineering colleges evolves to be more inclusive.

When assigning teams in classrooms, evidence has pointed instructors to avoid student-selected teams or random-assignment and rely on criteria-based team assignments instead. Traditionally, instructors have chosen various criteria like academic performance, skills, prior knowledge in the topic area, demographics, personality types, learning preferences, and even schedules to divide students into homogeneous or heterogeneous teams. Lack of cultural competency and awareness, however, can often lead to team dysfunction in academic settings when students face difficulty in interacting with each other due to language and cultural differences. Some studies have retroactively investigated the cultural competency of members in teams formed using traditional criteria. But, the literature shows little to no evidence on the impact of using cultural competency as one of the criteria for creating teams in engineering classrooms. This research attempts to fill this gap and examine team dynamics as a result of this. The research question investigated in this study is: how do team dynamics differ in teams that have been formed to represent homogeneity and heterogeneity in cultural competency respectively, in addition to traditional criteria?

The study is situated in a first-year introductory engineering course at a large, public, midwestern, R1 university with a class size of about 1450 students divided into about 27 sections. Student teams are usually formed in the beginning of the semester based on prior knowledge of programming and computing skills in addition to other demographics. In an experimental design, an additional criterion of cultural competency was added where sections of the course had teams with: homogeneous, heterogeneous, and random (control) cultural competency. Cultural competency was examined using the Miville-Guzman Universality-Diversity Scale short form (M-GUDS-S) which measures a single construct of Universal- diversity orientation (UDO) with three factors. Team dynamics were measured using instruments of team effectiveness at the end of the semester. The paper discusses the evidence of reliability and validity of the self-reported instruments with an analysis of differences in the team dynamics of sections based on homogeneous, heterogeneous, and control group of M-GUDs score. The study discusses the implications of assessing the cultural competencies of students in the context of teamwork in engineering classrooms and how different cultural competencies of students in a team impacts teamwork and in turn student learning.
AU - Jutshi Agarwal
AU - P.K. Imbrie
CY - Baltimore , Maryland
DA - 2023/06/25
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Team dynamics and cultural competency in a first-year engineering classroom
UR - https://peer.asee.org/44434
DO - 10.18260/1-2--44434
ER -