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1. Impacts Resulting from a Large-Scale First-Year Engineering and Computer Science Program on Students’ Successful Persistence Toward Degree Completion

   Ragusa, Gisele ; Allen, Emily L. ; Menezes, Gustavo B. ( June 2020 , ASEE Annual Conference Proceedings 2020)

   There is a critical need for more students with engineering and computer science majors to enter into, persist in, and graduate from four-year postsecondary institutions. Increasing the diversity of the workforce by inclusive practices in engineering and science is also a profound identified need. According to national statistics, the largest groups of underrepresented minority students in engineering and science attend U.S. public higher education institutions. Most often, a large proportion of these students come to colleges and universities with unique challenges and needs, and are more likely to be first in their family to attend college. In response to these needs, engineering education researchers and practitioners have developed, implemented and assessed interventions to provide support and help students succeed in college, particularly in their first year. These interventions typically target relatively small cohorts of students and can be managed by a small number of faculty and staff. In this paper, we report on “work in progress” research in a large-scale, first-year engineering and computer science intervention program at a public, comprehensive university using multivariate comparative statistical approaches. Large-scale intervention programs are especially relevant to minority serving institutions that prepare growing numbers of students who are first in their family to attend college and who are also under-resourced, financially. These students most often encounter academic difficulties and come to higher education with challenging experiences and backgrounds. Our studied first-year intervention program, first piloted in 2015, is now in its 5th year of implementation. Its intervention components include: (a) first-year block schedules, (b) project-based introductory engineering and computer science courses, (c) an introduction to mechanics course, which provides students with the foundation needed to succeed in a traditional physics sequence, and (d) peer-led supplemental instruction workshops for calculus, physics and chemistry courses. This intervention study responds to three research questions: (1) What role does the first-year intervention’s components play in students’ persistence in engineering and computer science majors across undergraduate program years? (2) What role do particular pedagogical and cocurricular support structures play in students’ successes? And (3) What role do various student socio-demographic and experiential factors play in the effectiveness of first-year interventions? To address these research questions and therefore determine the formative impact of the firstyear engineering and computer science program on which we are conducting research, we have collected diverse student data including grade point averages, concept inventory scores, and data from a multi-dimensional questionnaire that measures students’ use of support practices across their four to five years in their degree program, and diverse background information necessary to determine the impact of such factors on students’ persistence to degree. Background data includes students’ experiences prior to enrolling in college, their socio-demographic characteristics, and their college social capital throughout their higher education experience. For this research, we compared students who were enrolled in the first-year intervention program to those who were not enrolled in the first-year intervention. We have engaged in cross-sectional 2 data collection from students’ freshman through senior years and employed multivariate statistical analytical techniques on the collected student data. Results of these analyses were interesting and diverse. Generally, in terms of backgrounds, our research indicates that students’ parental education is positively related to their success in engineering and computer science across program years. Likewise, longitudinally (across program years), students’ college social capital predicted their academic success and persistence to degree. With regard to the study’s comparative research of the first-year intervention, our results indicate that students who were enrolled in the first-year intervention program as freshmen continued to use more support practices to assist them in academic success across their degree matriculation compared to students who were not in the first-year program. This suggests that the students continued to recognize the value of such supports as a consequence of having supports required as first-year students. In terms of students’ understanding of scientific or engineering-focused concepts, we found significant impact resulting from student support practices that were academically focused. We also found that enrolling in the first-year intervention was a significant predictor of the time that students spent preparing for classes and ultimately their grade point average, especially in STEM subjects across students’ years in college. In summary, we found that the studied first-year intervention program has longitudinal, positive impacts on students’ success as they navigate through their undergraduate experiences toward engineering and computer science degrees. 

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2. Introductory physics laboratory practical exam development: Investigation design, explanation, and argument

   https://doi.org/10.1119/perc.2019.pr.Wolf  

   Wolf, Steven F. ; Sprague, Mark W. ; Li, Feng ; Smith-Joyner, Annalisa ; Walker, Joi P. ( July 2019 , Physics Education Research Conference)

   This study reports the development, validation, and implementation of a practical exam to assess science practices in an introductory physics laboratory. The exam asks students to design and conduct an investigation, perform data analysis, and write an argument. The exam was validated with advanced physics undergraduate students and undergraduate students in introductory physics lecture courses. Face validity has been established by administering the practical in 65 laboratory sections over the course of three semesters. We found that the greatest source of variability in this exam was due to instructor grading issues and discuss the implications of this result for our ongoing assessment efforts. 

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3. First-Year Experience (FYrE@ECST): Pre-Physics Course (WIP)

   Li, Ni ; Menezes, Gustavo B. ; Allen, Emily L ; Nerenberg, Paul ( April 2018 , Proceedings 2018 CONECD Conference)

   The College of Engineering, Computer Science, and Technology (ECST) at California State University, Los Angles, an Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) with over 60% Hispanic students, is committed to improving graduation rates through the Grad initiative 2025 (the California State University’s initiative to increase graduation rates for all CSU students while eliminating achievement gaps). The majority of our students are under-represented minorities, low-income, Pell-eligible and first generation. Currently, one quarter of the students leaving the major before the second year. Many that “survive” the first two years of math and science do not develop the knowledge and the skills that are needed to succeed in upper division engineering courses, leading to more students unable to finish their engineering majors. Three years ago, we launched a pilot program for the First-Year Experience at ECST (FYrE@ECST) for incoming freshmen. The program focuses on providing academic support for math and physics courses while introducing students to the college community, and comprises a summer bridge program, a hands-on introductory course, cohorted math and science sections, and staff and faculty mentoring. Academic support is provided through peer-led supplemental instruction (SI) workshops. The workshops have led to a significant improvement in student performance in Math, but have had no significant impact in the student performance in physics. Our hypothesis is that students, in addition to having limited understanding of calculus, struggle to understand the fundamental principles of physics and thus cannot apply their knowledge of math to theories in physics to solve problems. This work-in-progress paper describes an inquiry-based hands-on pre-physics course for first-year students as part of the FYrE@ECST program. The course is intended to prepare students for the calculus-based mechanics course in physics and covers about half of the competencies of a classical mechanics course, with focuses on the fundamental concepts of mechanics (i.e. Newton’s Laws, Types of forces, vectors, free-body diagrams, position, velocity and acceleration). Equations are only introduced in the second half of the semester, while the first half is directed to help students develop a deep understanding of these fundamental concepts. During classes, students run simple experiments, watch segments of movies and cartoons and are asked questions (written and orally) which can guide them to think intuitively and critically. A think-pair-share mode of instruction is implemented to promote inquiry and discussion. Students work in groups of five to discuss and solve problems, carry out experiments to better understand processes and systems, and share what they learned with the whole class. The paper presents preliminary results on student achievement. 

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4. Hermione and the Secretary: how gendered task division in introductory physics labs can disrupt equitable learning

   https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6404/ab7831  

   Doucette, Danny ; Clark, Russell ; Singh, Chandralekha ( April 2020 , European Journal of Physics)

   Physics labs provide a unique opportunity for students to grow their physics identity and science identity in general since they provide students with an opportunity to tinker with experiments and analyze data in a low-stakes environment. However, it is important to ensure that all students are benefiting from the labs equally and have a positive growth trajectory. Through interviews and reflexive ethnographic observations, we identify and analyze two common modes of work that may disadvantage female students in introductory physics labs. Students who adopt the Secretary archetype are relegated to recording and analyzing data, and thus may miss out on much of the opportunity to grow their physics and science identities by engaging fully in the experimental work. Meanwhile, students in the Hermione archetype shoulder a disproportionate amount of managerial work, and also may not get an adequate opportunity to engage with different aspects of the experimental work that is essential for helping them develop their physics and science identities. We use a physics identity framework to investigate how students under these modes of work may experience stunted growth in their physics and science identity trajectories in their physics lab course. This stunted growth can then perpetuate and reinforce societal stereotypes and biases about who does physics. Our categorization not only gives a vocabulary to discussions about equity in the physics lab, but may also serve as a useful touchstone for those who seek to center equity in efforts to transform physics instruction.

    

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5. Developing a Model of Disciplinary Literacy Instruction for K-12 Engineering Education: Comparing the Literacy Practices of Electrical and Mechanical Engineers (Fundamental)

   Green, T. ; Wilson-Lopez, A. ; Minichiello, A. ( July 2019 , ASEE Annual Conference proceedings)

   Despite efforts to diversify the engineering workforce, the field remains dominated by White, male engineers. Research shows that underrepresented groups, including women and minorities, are less likely to identify and engage with scientific texts and literacy practices. Often, children of minority groups and/or working-class families do not receive the same kinds of exposure to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) knowledge and practices as those from majority groups. Consequently, these children are less likely to engage in school subjects that provide pathways to engineering careers. Therefore, to mitigate the lack of diversity in engineering, new approaches able to broadly support engineering literacy are needed. One promising approach is disciplinary literacy instruction (DLI). DLI is a method for teaching students how advanced practitioners in a given field generate, interpret, and evaluate discipline-specific texts. DLI helps teachers provide access to to high quality, discipline-specific content to all students, regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, or socio-economic status, Therefore, DLI has potential to reduce literacy-based barriers that discourage underrepresented students from pursuing engineering careers. While models of DLI have been developed and implemented in history, science, and mathematics, little is known about DLI in engineering. The purpose of this research is to identify the authentic texts, practices, and evaluative frameworks employed by professional engineers to inform a model of DLI in engineering. While critiques of this approach may suggest that a DLI model will reflect the literacy practices of majority engineering groups, (i.e., White male engineers), we argue that a DLI model can directly empower diverse K-16 students to become engineers by instructing them in the normed knowledge and practices of engineering. This paper presents a comparative case study conducted to investigate the literacy practices of electrical and mechanical engineers. We scaffolded our research using situated learning theory and rhetorical genre studies and considered the engineering profession as a community of practice. We generated multiple types of data with four participants (i.e., two electrical and two mechanical engineers). Specifically, we generated qualitative data, including written field notes of engineer observations, interview transcripts, think-aloud protocols, and engineer logs of literacy practices. We used constant comparative analysis (CCA) coding techniques to examine how electrical and mechanical engineers read, wrote, and evaluated texts to identify the frameworks that guide their literacy practices. We then conducted within-group and cross-group constant comparative analyses (CCA) to compare and contrast the literacy practices specific to each sub-discipline Findings suggest that there are two types of engineering literacy practices: those that resonate across both mechanical and electrical engineering disciplines and those that are specific to each discipline. For example, both electrical and mechanical engineers used test procedures to review and assess steps taken to evaluate electrical or mechanical system performance. In contrast, engineers from the two sub-disciplines used different forms of representation when depicting components and arrangements of engineering systems. While practices that are common across sub-disciplines will inform a model of DLI in engineering for K-12 settings, discipline-specific practices can be used to develop and/or improve undergraduate engineering curricula. 

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