An official website of the United States government
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.
more »
« less
Role Models in Action Through YouTube Videos for Engineering Community College Students
Abstract Community colleges provide broad access to a college degree due to their less expensive tuition, greater course time offerings, and more open admission policies compared to four-year universities as reported (Juszkiewicz, 2015). These institutions have great potential to diversify who chooses STEM, such as engineering. Such diverse representation is important, because students from different backgrounds can contribute new perspectives that foster creative and innovative approaches to solving problems. However, approximately 40% of the students who enter community college in the U.S. leave before graduation (Xu & Jaggars, 2011). Harnessing the power of social media to reduce attrition, we tested a pilot intervention in which community college students in engineering courses completed a reflection exercise after watching YouTube videos of former engineering students from similar backgrounds who successfully transferred to a four-year college. Quasi-experimental analyses (N = 537) show that students in the intervention received higher engineering course grades and had greater odds of enrolling in an engineering course in the subsequent term compared to those who were not in the intervention. Additionally, we find support for the hypothesis that the intervention has larger benefits for women. Results suggest that hearing from other students about their engineering experience can be a useful tool for improving community college students’ choices and performance.
more »
« less
- Award ID(s):
- 1742627
- PAR ID:
- 10487104
- Publisher / Repository:
- Springer Science + Business Media
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Research in Higher Education
- Volume:
- 65
- Issue:
- 5
- ISSN:
- 0361-0365
- Format(s):
- Medium: X Size: p. 1007-1039
- Size(s):
- p. 1007-1039
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
-
This completely evidence-based paper focuses on the impact of the “Engineering Learning Community” on the retention rate of the first-year students. The Engineering Learning Community (ELC) was launched in 2016 and works to increase student collaboration from day one, and to increase interest in engineering through an introductory design course for first year freshman students. ELC students not only take this design course but are matriculated into common first year Math and English courses. These attributes are thought to enhance the student’s ability to overcome the hurdles of their first year and improve their interest in completing a four-year degree at the Engineering College. Since then, three cohorts of ELC students have been observed through the lens of retention, and this study is intended to show how the ELC is affiliated with retention. The results from this study indicate that first year GPA is strongly related to first year retention at the Engineering College, and that students participating in the ELC are observed to have a higher GPA at the end of their first year when compared to the rest of the students in the Engineering College. In addition, interviews with ELC members further demonstrate the influence of a cohort-style learning community on first-year students’ experiences in higher education.more » « less
-
This completely evidence-based paper focuses on the impact of the Engineering Learning Communities” on the retention rate of the first-year students. The University of Colorado at Denver has recognized the need to increase retention rates at the Engineering College and has created a Learning Community to aid in this effort. The Engineering Learning Community (ELC) was launched in 2016 and works to increase student collaboration from day one, and to increase interest in engineering through an introductory design course for first year freshman students. ELC students not only take this design course but are matriculated into common first year Math and English courses. These attributes are thought to enhance the student’s ability to overcome the hurdles of their first year and improve their interest in completing a four-year degree at the Engineering College. Since then, three cohorts of ELC students have been observed through the lens of retention, and this study is intended to show how the ELC is affiliated with retention. The results from this study indicate that first year GPA is strongly related to first year retention at the Engineering College, and that students participating in the ELC are observed to have a higher GPA at the end of their first year when compared to the rest of the students in the Engineering College.more » « less
-
Community colleges play an important role in educating future scientists and engineers, especially among students from groups that are traditionally underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Community college transfer programs offer lower-division courses that students can take in preparation for transfer to a four-year program. For many small community colleges, however, developing a comprehensive transfer engineering program that prepares students to be competitive for transfer can be challenging due to a lack of facilities, resources, and local expertise. As a result, engineering education becomes inaccessible to many community college students. Through a grant from the National Science Foundation Improving Undergraduate STEM Education program (NSF IUSE), three community colleges from Northern California collaborated to develop resources and teaching strategies to enable small-to-medium community college engineering programs to support a comprehensive set of lower-division engineering courses that are delivered either completely online, or with limited face-to-face interactions. This paper focuses on the development and testing of the teaching and learning resources for Engineering Graphics, which is a four-unit course (three units of lecture and one unit of lab) covering the principles of engineering drawings, computer-aided design (using both AutoCAD and SolidWorks), and the engineering design process. The paper also presents the results of the pilot implementation of the curriculum, as well as a comparison of the outcomes of the online course with those from a regular, face-to-face course. Student performance on labs and tests in the two parallel sections of the course are compared. Additionally student surveys and interviews, conducted in both the online and face-to-face course are used to document and compare students’ perceptions of their learning experience, the effectiveness of the course resources, their use of these resources, and their overall satisfaction with the course.more » « less
-
There is an increasing recognition among institutions of higher education of the important role that community colleges play in educating future engineers and scientists, especially students from traditionally underrepresented groups. Two-plus-two programs and articulation agreements between community colleges and four-year institutions are growing, allowing community college students to take their lower-division courses at local community colleges and then transfer to a university to complete their baccalaureate degrees. For many small community colleges, however, developing a comprehensive transfer engineering program that prepares students to be competitive for transfer can be challenging due to a lack of facilities, resources, and local expertise. As a result, many community college students transfer without completing the necessary courses for transfer, making timely completion of degrees difficult. Through a grant from the National Science Foundation Improving Undergraduate STEM Education program (NSF IUSE), three community colleges from Northern California collaborated to develop resources and alternative teaching strategies to enable small-to-medium community college engineering programs to support a comprehensive set of lower-division engineering courses that are delivered either completely online, or with limited face-to-face interactions. The biggest challenge in developing such strategies lies in designing and implementing courses that have lab components. This paper focuses on the development and testing of the teaching and learning resources for Engineering Graphics, which is a four-unit course (three units of lecture and one unit of lab) covering the principles of engineering drawings, computer-aided design (using both AutoCAD and SolidWorks), and the engineering design process. The paper also presents the results of the implementation of the curriculum, as well as a comparison of the outcomes of the online course with those from a regular, face-to-face course. Student performance on labs and tests in the two parallel sections of the course are compared. Additionally student surveys and interviews, conducted in both the online and face-to-face course are used to document and compare students’ perceptions of their learning experience, the effectiveness of the course resources, their use of these resources, and their overall satisfaction with the course.more » « less
