More Like this

1. Bridging Psychology and Engineering: Undergraduate Conceptions of Human Systems Engineering

   https://doi.org/10.1177/1071181320641115  

   Roscoe, Rod D.; Arnold, Samuel T.; Clark, Ashley T. (December 2020, Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society Annual Meeting)

   null (Ed.)

   Instruction and coursework that link engineering and psychology may enable future engineers to better understand the people they are engineering for (e.g., users and clients) and themselves as engineers (e.g., teammates). In addition, human-centered engineering education may empower engineering students to better solve problems at the intersection of technology and people. In this study, we surveyed students’ conceptions and attitudes toward human systems engineering. We aggregate responses across three survey iterations to discuss students’ knowledge and beliefs, and to consider instructional opportunities for introductory courses. 

   more » « less
2. Development of a Mentorship Program in Engineering and Engineering Technology

   https://doi.org/10.18260/p.23862  

   Kaul, Sudhir; Chang, Guanghsu; Yanik, Paul; Ferguson, Chip (June 2015, American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference and Exposition -)

   This paper discusses feasible means of integrating mentorship programs into engineering and engineering technology curricula. The two main motivations for investigating the development of such programs are to improve retention rates and to augment the efforts toward increasing the enrollment of minority students. In fact, it can be argued that a mentorship program can also indirectly assist in the achievement of critical student outcomes for accreditation. The model of mentorship presented in this paper involves a vertical integration of cohorts through a series of project-based learning (PBL) courses. Furthermore, this attempt is enhanced by the introduction of incentives that encourage student involvement in undergraduate research as well as on-campus engineering organizations. The specific focus of the mentorship is on student-student relationships in addition to the conventional faculty-student relationships. These relationships allow students to learn from each other since they are able to strongly relate to each other’s experiences among their peer group. The mentoring model proposed in this paper formulates a learning community that allows the student to form a support group and a mechanism for preventive intervention, as discussed in other studies on mentoring programs. Such student engagement is commonly acknowledged to significantly benefit the students as well as the student mentors involved in the program. Data from an initial student survey that measures the efficacy of the proposed mentorship program is included in this paper and these data are discussed in detail. A 1-5 Likert scale is used for quantitative analysis of the data in order to evaluate the self-efficacy of the program. The group size of the mentorship cohort has been limited to a maximum of thirty students at this stage. Preliminary analysis of the data indicates that the participating students have a strongly positive opinion of the program. 

   more » « less
3. Intellectual Mental Models of Engineering and Non-Engineering Undergraduate Students,

   Khan, M. J.; Aji, C. A. (May 2022, ASEE Region IV Conference)

   The traditional educational paradigm encourages the development of dualistic intellectual mental models of the world view. Students strive to get the correct answer as expected by the teacher. With the development of understanding of the world view and student agency, the mental models move towards multiplicity and finally to a relativistic understanding. This paper discusses the cognitive development of undergraduate students and the impact of duration of stay in college. A validated instrument was used to measure anchoring of student mental models across the spectrum of duality, multiplicity, relativity, and commitment. Data were analyzed to determine the differences between engineering and non-engineering students. The influence of gender was studied. The effect of the academic standing was also investigated. Results of these analyses are shared. 

   more » « less
4. The Engineering of Climate Engineering

   https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-control-053018-023725  

   MacMartin, Douglas G.; Kravitz, Ben (May 2019, Annual Review of Control, Robotics, and Autonomous Systems)

   While reducing anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions remains the most essential element of any strategy to manage climate change risk, it is also in principle possible to directly cool the climate by reflecting some sunlight back to space. Such climate engineering approaches include adding aerosols to the stratosphere and marine cloud brightening. Assessing whether these ideas could reduce risk requires a broad, multidisciplinary research effort spanning climate science, social sciences, and governance. However, if such strategies were ever used, the effort would also constitute one of the most critical engineering design and control challenges ever considered: making real-time decisions for a highly uncertain and nonlinear dynamic system with many input variables, many measurements, and a vast number of internal degrees of freedom, the dynamics of which span a wide range of timescales. Here, we review the engineering design aspects of climate engineering, discussing both progress to date and remaining challenges that will need to be addressed. 

   more » « less
5. Impact of Nanoscale Science and Engineering Course on Undergraduate Engineering Education

   https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--34756  

   Yasar-Inceoglu, Ozgul (June 2020, 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access Proceedings)

   null (Ed.)

   Nanoscience and nanotechnology play a significant role in every field of our society. Nanotechnology is the backbone of high-tech industries and widely used in consumer products and industrial applications. Therefore, it is essential to highlight the importance of nanoscience and nanotechnology to undergraduate students and explain the science behind nanotechnology. For this purpose, an upper-level elective mechanical engineering course, Nanoscale Science and Engineering, is designed and added to the mechanical and mechatronic engineering curriculum. This course introduces students to the interdisciplinary field of nanoscience and engineering including the areas of engineering, materials science, chemistry, and physics. The topics covered include advanced materials, synthesis, and modification of nanomaterials, properties of nanomaterials, materials characterization, nanofabrication methods, and applications. It has three modules, which are formal lectures, guest speakers, and projects. Projects will help students learn to conduct a literature search, critically review scientific articles, and learn advanced materials characterization techniques on a given topic. They will further have a chance to propose their own ideas for potential applications and asked to give a detailed methodology to execute the project. In this work-in-progress study, we present the impact of the Nanoscale Science and Engineering course on undergraduate mechanical and mechatronic engineering students. Students were invited to complete a survey at the beginning of the semester, which will be also given to the students, at the end of the semester. The survey consists of 15 questions, which are aimed to analyze the pre-existing knowledge of students in nanotechnology-related topics and their interest level to increase their knowledge and advance their career in a nanotechnology-related field. In order to assess the impact of the course on students, the results of the survey will be compared. Student demographics will be included in the results. Possible changes in course content to improve student engagement in nanotechnology will be discussed. The purpose of this course is to introduce undergraduate engineering students to nanotechnology. The inclusion of Nanoscale Science and Engineering course to the undergraduate engineering curriculum has a significant role in the advancement of nanotechnology. Students graduating with a solid understanding of broad applications of nanotechnology and advanced material fabrication and characterization techniques will have a focused start in their graduate research and education or faster adaptation to nanotechnology-related industrial job positions. 

   more » « less