More Like this

1. Impact of the Emerging Engineering Education Research and Innovation Community

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--34759  

   Fentiman, Audeen; Riley, Donna; Litzler, Elizabeth; London, Jeremi; Williams, Julia; Case, Jennifer (June 2020, ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition)

   The Engineering Education departments at three large public universities are collaborating on an NSF-funded program to document the impact of the emerging EER&I community. This paper is a report on what has been learned to date. Goals of the program include (1) identifying the broader EER&I network, (2) identifying examples of EER&I impact, (3) organizing and hosting a summit of EER&I leaders to develop a systematic process for documenting the impact of EER&I, (4) piloting the process, and (5) compiling and disseminating best practices. Members of the community have been identified, including many who are conducting engineering education research without being part of a formal engineering education program, and some examples of the impact of engineering education research have been gathered. The summit has been held, and a process for documenting the impact of EER&I has been proposed. Results of the summit include a range of possible metrics that can be used to document EER&I impact and ways to communicate that impact. Some pilots have been conducted at the three collaborating schools and several other sites, and a few institutions are now preparing documentation. Results of the summit and the pilots will be shared. In their pilots, engineering education programs have been able to collect and analyze data that describe their efforts to impact how engineering is taught at the university level. Quantitative metrics include research expenditures, publications, number of graduates, positions graduates hold, faculty leadership in groups that influence engineering education policy, and so on. It has proven to be more difficult to demonstrate a direct causal relationship between those efforts and actual changes in the way engineering is taught in the traditional disciplines. The path to each change seems to be unique, and the most effective way to convey the impact is through telling each individual story. Thus, ongoing work focuses on generating a range of qualitative approaches that can be used to document and analyze these change processes. Collaborators on the NSF program are currently piloting ways to convey those stories to the many audiences interested in the results. 

   more » « less
2. High-Impact Practices in Materials Science Education: Student Research Internships Leading to Pedagogical Innovation in STEM Laboratory Learning Activities

   https://doi.org/10.1557/adv.2017.106  

   Porter, Lon A. (January 2017, MRS Advances)

   ABSTRACT Traditional lecture-centered approaches alone are inadequate for preparing students for the challenges of creative problem solving in the STEM disciplines. As an alternative, learnercentered and other high-impact pedagogies are gaining prominence. The Wabash College 3D Printing and Fabrication Center (3D-PFC) supports several initiatives on campus, but one of the most successful is a computer-aided design (CAD) and fabrication-based undergraduate research internship program. The first cohort of four students participated in an eight-week program during the summer of 2015. A second group of the four students was successfully recruited to participate the following summer. This intensive materials science research experience challenged students to employ digital design and fabrication in the design, testing, and construction of inexpensive scientific instrumentation for use in introductory STEM courses at Wabash College. The student research interns ultimately produced a variety of successful new designs that could be produced for less than $25 per device and successfully detect analytes of interest down to concentrations in the parts per million (ppm) range. These student-produced instruments have enabled innovations in the way introductory instrumental analysis is taught on campus. Beyond summer work, the 3D-PFC staffed student interns during the academic year, where they collaborated on various cross-disciplinary projects with students and faculty from departments such as mathematics, physics, biology, rhetoric, history, classics, and English. Thus far, the student work has led to three campus presentations, four presentations at national professional conferences, and three peer-reviewed publications. The following report highlights initial progress as well as preliminary assessment findings. 

   more » « less
3. Enhancing STEM Graduate Education: The Design, Development, and Piloting of a Course to Promote Research Innovation, Mentoring, and Career Readiness

   A.J Metz, Karen Tao (January 2024, 2024 Hawaii International Conference on Education)

   Roundtable discussion: Join us for a discussion on the ideal components of STEM graduate education. We will present information on the design, development, and piloting of a new graduate course to promote research innovation, mentoring, and career readiness. We will share our experiences working with graduate students in electrical engineering and highlight specific course content and assignments that respond to recommendations from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 

   more » « less
4. STEM Graduate Students’ Development at the Intersection of Research, Leadership, and Innovation

   https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3779055  

   Lenhart, Cindy; Bouwma-Gearhart, Jana; Keszler, Douglas; Giordan, Judith; Carter, Rich; Dolgos, Michelle (March 2021, SSRN Electronic Journal)

   null (Ed.)

   Researcher innovation and leadership skills are fundamental to create implementable solutions to pressing societal- and market-based global problems. The Research to Innovation to Society (R2I2S) program is a transformative approach to graduate education, training students at the intersection of research, innovation, and leadership. We detail the design of the program, and a three-year exploratory investigation of its impact at one research university in the western United States. We found that, overall, students who participated in the program realized the value of thinking about their scientific research from a market-need perspective. Students perceived enhanced interest in and understanding of societal and market insights related to their own and other’s research. As well, students developed professional skills in communication, team collaboration, innovation, and entrepreneurial skills. We situate our findings in frameworks concerning the development of emerging professionals and argue for programming for STEM graduate students that extends the deep discipline knowledge-based model of professional development into one inclusive of leadership, communication, and innovation goals. 

   more » « less
5. Overview of Student Innovation Competitions and Their Roles in STEM Education,

   Kulturel-Konak, S. (October 2021, Proceedings of the Fall 2021 Middle Atlantic Section ASEE Conference)