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1. Re-contextualizing Civil Engineering Education: A Systematic Review of the Literature

   Sanford, K. ; Paige, F. ; Parker, P. ; Valdes-Vasquez, R. ; Canevari, P. ; Larsen, T. ; Diacik, E. ( June 2022 , 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition)

   Emphasizing socio-political context in undergraduate engineering courses is a complex challenge for accredited American engineering programs as they strive to pivot towards a more equitable future. Teaching engineering problem solving by isolating the technical perspective is the dominant culture, and change has been slow and insufficient. Looking at the complex human circumstances in which engineered systems are situated has significant, and sometimes life saving, benefits. On the contrary, the common de-contextualized approach to teaching engineering has been shown to have significant impacts on how students behave as future engineers. Furthermore, eurocentric teaching practices have been documented as a contributor to the lack of gender and ethnic diversity in engineering. Re-contextualizing civil engineering courses has shown to increase students' motivation, sense of social responsibility, and agency. The ASCE Code of Ethics states that “Engineers … first and foremost, protect the health, safety, and welfare of the public,” a notion that was first added to the code in 1977. In recent years, some civil and environmental engineering (CEE) faculty members and programs have responded to this ethical imperative by re-contextualizing civil engineering education in relation to the communities (“the public”) the civil engineer is ethically obligated to protect and serve. To determinemore »the extent of these efforts to re-introduce socio-technical context in CEE curricula, we are conducting a systematic review of the published literature. The objectives of this research are to document, synthesize, and amplify the work of these scholars and to encourage the community of CEE faculty to re-contextualize the knowledge and skills taught in the CEE curriculum. This paper describes the methodology, including search terms and sources examined, reports the preliminary results of the review, and synthesizes the preliminary findings. Future work will propose strategies and structures that could be adapted and employed by civil engineering faculty throughout the U.S. to 1) engage and retain students from groups that historically have been excluded from CEE and 2) better educate CEE students to engineer a more equitable and just future.« less
2. Re-contextualizing Civil Engineering Education: A Systematic Review of the Literature

   Sanford, K. ; Paige, F. ; Parker, P. ; Valdes-Vasquez, R. ; Canevari, P. ; Larsen, T. ; Diacik, E. ( January 2022 , 2022 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition)

   Emphasizing socio-political context in undergraduate engineering courses is a complex challenge for accredited American engineering programs as they strive to pivot towards a more equitable future. Teaching engineering problem solving by isolating the technical perspective is the dominant culture, and change has been slow and insufficient. Looking at the complex human circumstances in which engineered systems are situated has significant, and sometimes life saving, benefits. On the contrary, the common de-contextualized approach to teaching engineering has been shown to have significant impacts on how students behave as future engineers. Furthermore, eurocentric teaching practices have been documented as a contributor to the lack of gender and ethinic diversity in engineering. Re-contextualizing civil engineering courses has shown to increase students' motivation, sense of social responsibility, and agency. The ASCE Code of Ethics states that “Engineers … first and foremost, protect the health, safety, and welfare of the public,” a notion that was first added to the code in 1977. In recent years, some civil and environmental engineering (CEE) faculty members and programs have responded to this ethical imperative by re-contextualizing civil engineering education in relation to the communities (“the public”) the civil engineer is ethically obligated to protect and serve. To determinemore »the extent of these efforts to re-introduce socio-technical context in CEE curricula, we are conducting a systematic review of the published literature. The objectives of this research are to document, synthesize, and amplify the work of these scholars and to encourage the community of CEE faculty to re-contextualize the knowledge and skills taught in the CEE curriculum. This paper describes the methodology, including search terms and sources examined, reports the preliminary results of the review, and synthesizes the preliminary findings. Future work will propose strategies and structures that could be adapted and employed by civil engineering faculty throughout the U.S. to 1) engage and retain students from groups that historically have been excluded from CEE and 2) better educate CEE students to engineer a more equitable and just future.« less
3. Re-contextualizing Civil Engineering Education: A Systematic Review of the Literature

   Sanford, K. ( August 2022 , ASEE annual conference)

   Emphasizing socio-political context in undergraduate engineering courses is a complex challenge for accredited American engineering programs as they strive to pivot towards a more equitable future. Teaching engineering problem solving by isolating the technical perspective is the dominant culture, and change has been slow and insufficient. Looking at the complex human circumstances in which engineered systems are situated has significant, and sometimes life saving, benefits. On the contrary, the common de-contextualized approach to teaching engineering has been shown to have significant impacts on how students behave as future engineers. Furthermore, eurocentric teaching practices have been documented as a contributor to the lack of gender and ethinic diversity in engineering. Re-contextualizing civil engineering courses has shown to increase students' motivation, sense of social responsibility, and agency. The ASCE Code of Ethics states that “Engineers … first and foremost, protect the health, safety, and welfare of the public,” a notion that was first added to the code in 1977. In recent years, some civil and environmental engineering (CEE) faculty members and programs have responded to this ethical imperative by re-contextualizing civil engineering education in relation to the communities (“the public”) the civil engineer is ethically obligated to protect and serve. To determinemore »the extent of these efforts to re-introduce socio-technical context in CEE curricula, we are conducting a systematic review of the published literature. The objectives of this research are to document, synthesize, and amplify the work of these scholars and to encourage the community of CEE faculty to re-contextualize the knowledge and skills taught in the CEE curriculum. This paper describes the methodology, including search terms and sources examined, reports the preliminary results of the review, and synthesizes the preliminary findings. Future work will propose strategies and structures that could be adapted and employed by civil engineering faculty throughout the U.S. to 1) engage and retain students from groups that historically have been excluded from CEE and 2) better educate CEE students to engineer a more equitable and just future.« less
4. Understanding the Professional Formation of Engineers through the Lens of Design Thinking: Unpacking theWicked Problem of Diversity and Inclusion

   Zoltowski, Carla B. ; Buzzanell, Patrice M. ; Brightman, Andrew O. ; Torres, David ; Eddington, Sean M. ( June 2017 , ASEE annual conference & exposition proceedings)

   Three broad issues have been identified in the professional formation of engineers: 1) the gap between what students learn in universities and what they practice upon graduation; 2) the limiting perception that engineering is solely technical, math, and theory oriented; and 3) the lack of diversity (representation of a wide range of people) and lack of inclusion (incorporation of different perspectives, values, and ways of thinking and being in engineering) in many engineering programs. These are not new challenges in engineering education, rather they are persistent and difficult to change. There have been countless calls to recruit and retain women and underrepresented minority group members into engineering careers and numerous strategies proposed to improve diversity, inclusion, and retention, as well as to calls to examine socio-technical integration in engineering cultures and education for professional formation. Despite the changes in some disciplinary profiles in engineering and the curricular reforms within engineering education, there still has not been the deep transformation needed to integrate inclusionary processes and thinking into professional formation. In part, the reason is that diversity and inclusion are still framed as simply “numbers problems” to be solved. What is needed instead is an approach that understands and explores diversitymore »and inclusion as interrelated with the epistemological (what do engineers need to know) and ontological (what does it mean to be an engineer) underpinnings of engineering. These issues are highly complex, interconnected, and not amenable to simple solutions, that is, they are “wicked” problems. They require design thinking. Thus our NSF-funded Research in the Formation of Engineers (RFE) study utilizes a design thinking approach and research activities to explore foundational understandings of formation and diversity and inclusion in engineering while addressing the three project objectives: 1) Better prepare engineers for today’s workforce; 2) Broaden understandings of engineering practice as both social and technical; and 3) Create and sustain more diverse and inclusionary engineering programs. The project is organized around the three phases of the design process (inspiration, ideation, and implementation), and embedded within the design process is a longitudinal, multiphase, mixed-methods study. Although the goal is to eventually study these objectives on a broader scale, we begin with a smaller context: the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering (BME) at Purdue University. These schools share similarities with some common coursework and faculty, but also provide contrasts as BME’s undergraduate population, on average for recent semesters, has been 44-46% female, where ECE has been 13-14% female. Although BME has slightly more underrepresented minority students (7-8% versus 5%), approximately 60% of BME students are white, versus 40% for ECE. It is important to note that Purdue’s School of ECE offers B.S. degrees in Electrical Engineering (EE) and Computer Engineering (CmpE), which reflect unique disciplinary cultures. Additionally, the schools differ significantly on undergraduate enrollment. The BME enrollment was 278, whereas ECE’s enrollment was 675 in EE and 541 in CmpE1. In this paper we describe the background literature and the research design, including the study contexts, target subject populations, and procedures for quantitative and qualitative data collection and analysis. In addition, we present the data collected during the first phase of the research project. In our poster, we will present preliminary analysis of the first phase data.« less
5. Early Engagement and Vertically-Integrated Learning: Developing Holistic and Entrepreneurially-Minded Engineers

   Zerbe, E. ; Amekudzi-Kennedy, A. ; Haas, K. ; Grubert, E. ; Burns, S. ; Russell, A. ; Tien, I. ; Watkins, K. ; Koon, J. ; Simon, R. ; et al ( June 2022 , ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition, American Society for Engineering Education)

   Nationwide, 40-60% of engineering students leave their engineering major, with women and underrepresented minorities doing so at higher rates. In the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE) at Georgia Institute of Technology in recent years, 50% of students have changed to a new major in their first two years, while roughly the same numbers have entered the program simultaneously from other engineering majors. Similar departure rates are seen in programs across the country. Reversing attrition from civil and environmental engineering is a critical need for addressing society’s grand challenges effectively. This attrition is due in part to limited discipline-focused engagement until students’ junior year. To address this, the School of CEE is providing early engagement in authentic engineering experiences and giving students the opportunity to reflect on these experiences to solidify their CEE identity. We are creating opportunities early and across the curriculum for our students to engage in interactive problem-based learning centered on the global grand challenges, while developing their technical and computational knowledge, skills, and mindset. We are also equipping our students to work effectively in teams and to apply story-driven learning to become more reflective learners. This takes the form of a “spine” of vertically-integrated courses.more »These innovations in the curriculum contribute to the development of holistic engineers with an enhanced sense of belonging to the discipline and a strengthened self-concept as a civil or environmental engineer. The initiative also supports the development of entrepreneurially minded engineers, that is, engineers who know how to create value for society and do so habitually. We outline these innovations in each of the four vertically-integrated courses, while emphasizing the techniques applied and how they connect to create a cohesive curriculum that engages students as engineers from the first year.« less