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While most instructional design courses and much of the instructional design industry focus on ADDIE (Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation,Evaluation), approaches such as design thinking, human-centered design, and agile methods like SAM (Successive Approximation Model), have drawn attention.This chapter unpacks what we know about design thinking and presents a concise history of design thinking to situate it within the broader design research fi eld. Itthen traces its emergence in other fi elds. The chapter considers lessons for instructional designers and concludes by setting an agenda to address issues forscholarship, teaching, and practice. 

In this research paper, we investigate the structure and validity of survey data related to students’ framing agency. In order to promote increased opportunities for students to engage in and learn to frame design problems that are innovative and empathetic, there is a need for instruments that can provide information about student progress and the quality of learning experiences. This is a complex problem because, compared to problem solving, design problem framing is less studied and harder to predict due to the higher levels of student agency involved. To address this issue, we developed a survey to measure framing agency, which is defined as opportunities to frame and reframe design problems and learn in the process. This study extends past research which focused on the construct of framing agency and developing an instrument to measure it following best practices in survey design, including using exploratory factor analysis of pilot data, which recovered six factors related to shared and individual consequentiality, problem structure and constrainedness, and learning. However, as a pilot, the sample limited generalizability; the current study addresses this limitation. We used a national cohort that included multiple engineering disciplines (biomedical, mechanical, chemical, electrical, computer, aerospace), types of formal design projects (e.g., first-year, design-spine, senior capstone) and institution types, including private religious; Hispanic-serving; public land-grant; and research flagship institutions (N=449). We report sample characteristics and used confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) to provide validity evidence, reporting the chi-square and standardized root mean square residual as estimates of fit. We report Cronbach’s alpha as a measure of internal consistency. We found that overall, the CFA aligned with the prior exploratory results, in this case, recovering four factors, measured on a seven-point scale: shared consequentiality (the extent to which the student identifies that their understanding of the problem changed as result of a teammate’s decision, M = 6.15; SD = 1.13); learning as consequentiality (the extent to which the student identifies learning as the result of decisions, M = 5.88; SD = 0.98); constrainedness (the extent to which the student reports the ability to make decisions despite design constraints, M = 4.95; SD = 1.49); and shared tentativeness (the extent to which the student identifies uncertainty about the problem and solution, M = 4.02; SD = 1.76). This suggests the survey can provide valid data for instructional decisions and further research into how students learn to frame engineering design problems and what role framing plays in their professional formation. 

In this poster, we report results related to an NSF EEC CAREER project that characterizes framing agency, defined as making decisions and learning in the process of framing design problems. Our past studies of framing agency have relied on discourse analysis to characterize agency in talk [1-3]. However, this analytical approach, with its focus on talk, misses much about the materials in the design process, and given that design is commonly cast as a conversation with materials [4], a fuller understanding of framing agency could come from attention to material interactions. This study aimed to investigate a design setting in which materials played a consequential role, and to incorporate another analytic method to attend to the roles of materials in framing agency. Specifically, we examined ways learners negotiated their agency with materials in the context of an informal STEM camp focused on learning about the past, present, and future of radio frequency communications. 

Laboratory experimentation is a key component of the development of professional engineers. However, experiments conducted in chemical engineering laboratory classes are commonly more prescriptive than the problems faced by practicing engineers, who have agency to make consequential decisions across the experiment and communication of results. Thus, understanding how experiments in laboratory courses vary in offering students opportunities to make such decisions, and how students navigate higher agency learning experiences is important for preparing graduates ready to direct these practices. In this study, we sought to answer the following research question: What factors are measured by the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey? To better understand student perceptions of their agency in relation to laboratory experiments, developed an initial version of the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey, following research-based survey development guidelines. We implemented it in six upper-division laboratory courses across two universities. We used exploratory factor analysis to investigate the validity of the data from the survey for measuring relevant constructs of authenticity, agency in specific domains, responsibility, and opportunity to make decisions. We found strong support for items measuring agency as responsibility, authenticity, agency in the communication domain, agency in the experimental design domain, and opportunity to make decisions. These findings provide a foundation for developing a more precise survey capable of measuring agency across various laboratory experiment practices. Such a survey will enable future studies that investigate the impacts of increasing agency in just one domain versus in several. In turn, this can aid faculty in developing higher agency learning experiences that are more feasible to implement, compared to authentic research experiences. 

Laboratory experimentation is a key component of the development of professional engineers. However, experiments conducted in chemical engineering laboratory classes are commonly more prescriptive than the problems faced by practicing engineers, who have agency to make consequential decisions across the experiment and communication of results. Thus, understanding how experiments in laboratory courses vary in offering students opportunities to make such decisions, and how students navigate higher agency learning experiences is important for preparing graduates ready to direct these practices. In this study, we sought to answer the following research questions: How do students perceive their agency in course-based undergraduate research experiences? What factors are measured by the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey? To better understand student perceptions of their agency in relation to laboratory experiments, we first conducted a case study of a course-based research experience (CURE) in a senior-level chemical engineering laboratory course. We then surveyed six upper-division laboratory courses across two universities using an initial version of the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey. We used exploratory factor analysis to investigate the validity of the data from the survey for measuring relevant constructs of authenticity, agency in specific domains, responsibility, and opportunity to make decisions. We found that with instructional support, students in the CURE recognized that failure could itself provide opportunities for learning. They valued having the agency to make consequential decisions, even when they also found the experience challenging. We also found strong support for items measuring agency as responsibility, authenticity, agency in the communication domain, agency in the experimental design domain, and opportunity to make decisions. These findings give us insight into the value of higher agency laboratory experiments, and they provide a foundation for developing a more precise survey capable of measuring agency across various laboratory experiment practices. Such a survey will enable future studies that investigate the impacts of increasing agency in just one domain versus in several. In turn, this can aid faculty in developing higher agency learning experiences that are more feasible to implement, compared to CUREs. 

Laboratory experimentation is a key component of the development of professional engineers. However, experiments conducted in chemical engineering laboratory classes are commonly more prescriptive than the problems faced by practicing engineers, who have agency to make consequential decisions across the experiment and communication of results. Thus, understanding how experiments in laboratory courses vary in offering students opportunities to make such decisions, and how students navigate higher agency learning experiences is important for preparing graduates ready to direct these practices. In this study, we sought to answer the following research question: What factors are measured by the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey? To better understand student perceptions of their agency in relation to laboratory experiments, developed an initial version of the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey, following research-based survey development guidelines. We implemented it in six upper-division laboratory courses across two universities. We used exploratory factor analysis to investigate the validity of the data from the survey for measuring relevant constructs of authenticity, agency in specific domains, responsibility, and opportunity to make decisions. We found strong support for items measuring agency as responsibility, authenticity, agency in the communication domain, agency in the experimental design domain, and opportunity to make decisions. These findings provide a foundation for developing a more precise survey capable of measuring agency across various laboratory experiment practices. Such a survey will enable future studies that investigate the impacts of increasing agency in just one domain versus in several. In turn, this can aid faculty in developing higher agency learning experiences that are more feasible to implement, compared to authentic research experiences. 

Laboratory experimentation is a key component of the development of professional engineers. However, experiments conducted in chemical engineering laboratory classes are commonly more prescriptive than the problems faced by practicing engineers, who have agency to make consequential decisions across the experiment and communication of results. Thus, understanding how experiments in laboratory courses vary in offering students opportunities to make such decisions, and how students navigate higher agency learning experiences is important for preparing graduates ready to direct these practices. In this study, we sought to answer the following research question: What factors are measured by the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey? To better understand student perceptions of their agency in relation to laboratory experiments, developed an initial version of the Consequential Agency in Laboratory Experiments survey, following research-based survey development guidelines. We implemented it in six upper-division laboratory courses across two universities. We used exploratory factor analysis to investigate the validity of the data from the survey for measuring relevant constructs of authenticity, agency in specific domains, responsibility, and opportunity to make decisions. We found strong support for items measuring agency as responsibility, authenticity, agency in the communication domain, agency in the experimental design domain, and opportunity to make decisions. These findings provide a foundation for developing a more precise survey capable of measuring agency across various laboratory experiment practices. Such a survey will enable future studies that investigate the impacts of increasing agency in just one domain versus in several. In turn, this can aid faculty in developing higher agency learning experiences that are more feasible to implement, compared to authentic research experiences. 

Empathy is vital to ethical, effective design, yet vexing to teach. While research suggests empathy can be developed through human-centered design, students still tend to narrowly scope design problems, ignore the heterogeneity of the stakeholders, and focus on only mainstream or very few individuals with specific needs. While engineering education has come to value empathy, literature suggests that we still have a very limited understanding of its nuances. We address this issue by introducing the construct expansive empathy, which we define as the ability to understand and generate inclusive design solutions that incorporate the complex interactions among the engineering system and the needs of diverse stakeholders, including those who are marginalized, mainstreamed, and vulnerable. We adapted the Interpersonal Reactivity Index to develop a measure to capture expansive empathy and performed an exploratory factor analysis. We examined factor structure using data collected at the beginning of a senior design class. Initial results suggest that students have not developed expansive empathy in their previous engineering courses. 

Over the past decade, much attention has focused on change-making efforts, especially those funded by the NSF Revolutionizing Engineering Departments program. We bring together theory on agency and intersectional power to investigate a research question: • How and over what/whom do faculty engaged in departmental change efforts express agency, with attention to structural, cultural, normative, and interpersonal power relations? We draw upon recordings of faculty meetings and interviews across multiple change teams and years to characterize consequential change agency. Analysis of these highlights how accounts of contentious events reveals power dynamics at play, and ways those in power prevent or promote change. We argue that key elements of change agency include meeting others where they are, sharing agency with them (“we”), using potential control verbs (can, could, might, etc.), acknowledging their concerns, and inviting them into the effort in ways that suggest ownership. 

A key challenge in engineering design problem framing is defining requirements and metrics. This is difficult, in part, because engineers must make decisions about how to treat qualitative and subjective issues, like stakeholder preferences, about how to prioritize different requirements, and about how to maintain tentativeness and ill-structuredness in the solution space. And this is made more challenging in light of the function of requirements in other types of engineering problems, like feasibility analysis, in which the requirements should converge on a decision. Given these challenges, it is unsurprising that there is limited research on how first-year students approach such work, how they make sense of requirements, and how their conceptualizations of requirements change with instruction. Our purpose in this study is to investigate students’ initial understanding and use of engineering requirements in a specific problem solving context. We developed a survey to measure students’ perceptions related to engineering requirements based on constructs derived from the literature on engineering requirements. We implemented the survey in a first-year and in senior courses for the purpose of validating items using factor analysis. Following this, we conducted analysis of survey and interview data restricted to the first-year course, including epistemic beliefs and analysis of students’ agency. Through exploratory factor analysis, we found that factors did not converge around constructs as described in the literature. Rather, factors formed around the forms of information leveraged to develop requirements. Through qualitative analysis of students’ responses on the survey and to interviews, we evaluated the extent to which students expressed agency over their use of requirements to make decisions within a course project. We describe implications of this exploratory study in terms of adapting research instruments to better understand this topic. Further, we consider pedagogical implications for first year programs and beyond in supporting students to develop ownership over decision making related to engineering requirements.