WPI at ASEE 2024

For example, Picard, Hardebolle, Tormey, and Schiffman (2021) found limited growth in professional skills in small, short-term project experiences. One potential amplifier of developing professional skills is self-efficacy. Capstones that employ project-based learning may be particularly well-positioned to scaffold students’ sense of confidence in their ability to accomplish more than they previously thought (Fini, Awadallah, Parast, & Abu-Lebdeh, 2018). This paper uses three sets of analyses to examine the extent to which intensive capstone project experiences can assist in developing students’ self-efficacy alongside professional skills, as well as the contribution of self-efficacy and professional skills to long-term career preparedness. Methodology: These questions are examined with a sample of 2,101 alumni from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) who completed a survey in 2021 about their educational experiences and its impact on their lives after graduation. All undergraduate students at WPI are required to complete a 9-credit major qualifying project in the final year to graduate. A series of hierarchical multiple linear regression models were constructed and assessed to determine the relative contributions of variables in predicting self-efficacy, each type of skill, and career preparation. Results: The first series of models found that the capstone experience has a moderately sized positive effect on self-efficacy, even after controlling for student demographics, response bias, courses in the major, and other project experiences. The second series of models found a similar effect on the development of communication skills, information use skills, and teamwork skills. Finally, the third series of models demonstrated that self-efficacy, communication skills, and information use skills all significantly contribute to alumni’s preparation for their current career; teamwork skills, however, did not. Conclusions/Significance: Self-efficacy is often implicit in the theories of action guiding capstone design (Pembridge & Paretti, 2019). The studies described in this paper explicitly confirm the significant role of capstones in developing students’ self-efficacy and their importance in preparing students for future engineering careers. This paper also extends prior research that stops short of assessing whether the self-efficacy and professional skills gained in capstones translates to career success.

Where experiencing a single high-impact practice is good, experiencing more than one can be even better. In this study we ask, to what extent does stacking additional high-impact practices on top of course-based PBL provide additional benefits for students? Methods: Data were collected from 420 alumni of Worcester Polytechnic Institute, which stacks project-based learning, first year seminars, global learning, community-based learning, and capstone projects. The survey asked alumni about their experiences with each high-impact practice and how much experiences influenced the development of skills and impacted various aspects of their lives. Hierarchical multiple regression was used to model the extent to which various educational experiences predict student outcomes. This analytical strategy allows us to compare the relative explanatory power of each block of variables, providing an assessment of their individual, relative, and cumulative value. Results: After controlling for significant influences of gender and response bias, the course-based projects model explained an additional two to five percent of the variance in developing all four types of skills assessed (teamwork, communication, information use, and cross-cultural skills), content mastery, career preparation, and developing a stronger character. This represents significant increases in explanatory power over that of the control models, establishing that course-based projects confer widespread benefits within the context of this case. Teamwork skills, communications skills, and information use skills were all positively influenced by stacking first year experiences, global experiences, community-based learning, and capstones on top of course-based projects. The development of cross-cultural skills was also significantly strengthened by the quality of a first-year experience, the extent learned from the local community, the quality of the community-based project experience, the quality of the capstone experience, and the number of global experiences. After accounting for the influence of response bias and the dosage of course-based projects, content mastery was also significantly increased through two additional high-impact practices: the extent learned from the local community and the quality of the capstone experience. Impacts on long-term outcomes are also discussed in the full paper. Implications: Experiencing high-impact practices can increase educational outcomes for all students, yet too few students receive sufficient opportunities to receive the full benefits of these educational practices. For institutions of higher education, increasing the types of high-impact practices offered to students can maximize institutional success and improve efficiency. Given prior research that demonstrates the potential for high-impact practices to level the playing field for marginalized students, stacking high-impact practices can also benefit society through broadening the talent pool tackling sustainable development goals.

This study uses an experimental design to assess the efficacy of a new app. Participants included 245 first- and second-year students in three sections of Statics at two universities (Worcester Polytechnic Institute and Bucknell University). Another 197 WPI students who took Statics before the app was created serve as a comparison group. Of the participants, 37% are women and 14% BIPOC. Data were collected using the retrospective Student Assessment of their Learning Gains - an NSF-funded and validated survey that asks students how much they learned for each of a set of learning objectives and the extent to which they attribute their learning to specific learning activities. Items were combined to construct measures of growth in self-efficacy related to statics, content mastery, and willingness to seek help. Independent sample t-tests and hierarchical multiple linear regression were used to assess learning outcomes and differences across genders and app use. Results: Students who had the app available and completed half or more of the games reported significantly greater gains in their ability to draw appropriate FBDs for given systems than those who did not have the app available to them. In a second set of analyses with the students who completed at least half the games in the app, using the FBD app was a significant predictor of content mastery after controlling for the influences of demographics, the professor, self-efficacy, attending lecture, listening to and participating in class discussion, and group project work. Other significant predictors included attending lectures and self-efficacy. Women who used the app reported greater gains in self-efficacy related to Statics and willingness to seek help than men; there were no gender differences in content mastery. Multiple linear regression models indicate that these gender effects remain after controlling for BIPOC status, the professor leading class, the influences of attending lecture, listening to, and participating in class discussion, group project work, and using the FBD app; among those who did not use the app, women reported fewer gains in self-efficacy than men after these controls. Implications: Each year, more than 600,000 students enter engineering programs in the United States (Roy, 2019). These students plan to master a challenging skill set that requires them to understand how to model and analyze real world problems. Frustrating core course experiences can dissuade students from continuing to pursue an engineering degree and subsequent career (Geisinger & Raman, 2013). These findings provide emerging evidence that gamifying learning can be useful for all students taking Statics, but particularly for women.

This article describes ConGrad, a convergent graduate education framework that combines transdisciplinary methodologies, experiential learning, and learning by teaching, within the context of a project-based curriculum. Using the ConGrad framework, we propose a program in which graduate students advise interdisciplinary undergraduate projects with societal impact. With such an opportunity to practice convergence research methodologies via project-based learning, graduate students will acquire new capabilities of solving complex problems as leaders of trandisciplinary teams, further removing the barriers against convergence research in industry and academia. We present one graduate student’s experience as preliminary qualitative evidence in support of the proposed program built with the ConGrad education framework.

A predominant hurdle in preparing engineers for this dynamic future is the prevalent risk-averse educational paradigm, significantly influenced by students' apprehension of failure. This fear often confines them within their academic silos, preventing the exploration of interdisciplinary realms and hindering departure from their technological comfort zones during their educational journey. In response, we introduced "Innovation Through Making," a multidisciplinary, project-based course designed to encourage quick learning, resilience, and the development of durable, adaptable skills. This course integrates Innovation and Entrepreneurship into the Engineering Sciences curriculum, providing students with practical experience in digital fabrication and engineering design. Through iterative design and prototyping, students tackle environmental or societal issues, using human-centered design and value creation principles.

Requirements are based on stakeholder and market analysis focused on quantitative data capture and tend to overlook the nuances and context of the underlying stakeholder population.  The problematic construct that emerges is the absence of a framework and related education for engineers to consider and design with ethical, equity, and social justice implications in mind.  Further, there is still a general lack of diversity of stakeholder parameters in early engineering design classes.  Introduction to systems engineering courses lack integration of current thinking on community engagement ethics and that absence can be seen across the systems engineering curriculum, as well.  We ask: How do we create learning opportunities/engineering interventions that are technically sound, and prioritize community voice, cultural appropriateness, and contextual efficacy?  In this paper, we review three methods of stakeholder analysis taught in system engineering courses and identify where and how one can integrate community voices through a decolonial lens.  We then propose a framework that encourages a more holistic understanding of the stakeholders and the positive and negative impacts on those stakeholders.

Targeted surveys in these advanced courses further confirmed the significance of addressing this matter. A market review, informed by these insights, was conducted to shape the course description. RBE students at WPI traditionally undertake programming courses from the Computer Science (CS) department; however, up to 30% encountered difficulties due to the mismatch between their needs and the CS-taught curriculum. The key differentiator of the RBE-tailored programming course, in comparison to traditional CS courses, is its project-based nature, where students learn programming concepts and directly apply them to real robotics projects. This work primarily focuses on the imperative of introducing a dedicated first-year programming course into the RBE curriculum, designed specifically for robotics, while highlighting WPI RBE's pioneering role in robotics education and the project-based approach that sets it apart. We aim to enhance the educational experience and preparedness of our students, ensuring that they are well-equipped to meet the demands of the rapidly evolving field of robotics. The pedagogical theory and approach underpinning this course will be presented, and the expected outcomes will be discussed, along with methods of assessment to evaluate its effectiveness. This endeavor is an effort to further enhance our existing RBE curriculum's excellence and adapt to the changing landscape of robotics engineering education while inspiring existing and future RBE departments in their creation of a curriculum.

The core objective of this research is to develop and disseminate an engineering curriculum implementing learning activities to teach the skill of troubleshooting. To achieve this, the study employs interviews with experienced engineers to explore their approaches to troubleshooting and problem solving in industry. The insights gained from these interviews are channeled towards the creation of a framework that incorporates a systematic approach to troubleshooting. We incorporate also widely used practices in sub-stages of troubleshooting, as informed by our pilot study. The study's findings hold implications for educators, industry professionals, and curriculum designers seeking to enhance the problem-solving skills of college students as future engineers. 

The streamlines over a car prototype in a wind tunnel, or the vortex formation of a hurricane, to name a couple, have become household images confirming the efficacy of this technique. Contrary to its importance and positive role in learning enhancement, flow visualization is not commonly used in undergraduate fluid dynamics courses. Factors such as the cost of equipment, time-consuming setup, and limited space in wind/water tunnels have kept hands-on fluid-related projects relatively rare at undergraduate institutions. This project aims to develop a low-cost, safe, and portable flow visualization system, paired with an open-source program. This setup is utilized for class experiments, student projects, and demonstrations for outreach efforts.

Lesson plans inspired by the UN SDGs research experience were developed as an “integrated STEM” problem solving activity by each of the RET teachers. Ten (10) teachers comprising of both pre-service and in-service middle or high school teachers have participated in each cohort over the two years of the NSF RET grant thus far. Six weeks of authentic summer research takes place in 5 different faculty labs at WPI under the mentorship of faculty and their graduate students or postdoc. Examples of the research projects include “Photocatalysis for Clean Energy and Environment,” “Genetically Engineering Plasmid DNA molecules to address Tuberculosis Antibiotic Resistance,” and “New Water-Based Technology for Plastic Recycling.” RET participants also attend a weekly coffee session to help guide the teachers through the research process and a weekly ½-day professional development (PD) session to translate the research experience into a classroom lesson plan that aligns to state standards, as well as evidence-backed curriculum design and teaching strategies. For evaluation of the RET program, pre/post-surveys measured the teacher’s self-reported ability, confidence, understanding, and frequency of use of the Engineering Design Process (EDP), Integrated STEM, and the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The RET participants share that they are bringing in the “real world” relevance to their students with an integrated STEM lens (e.g., climate change and UN SDGs) and that they refer back to their own lab experiences (e.g., importance of measuring chemicals accurately). The research experience has made several positive impacts on the teacher participants that also benefit their students.

Encompassing a sample size of 51 students spanning two course offerings, this paper elaborates on the pedagogy and insights garnered from the students' Failure Journals, culminating with a survey assessing their perceived learning gains.

This study shows the need for immersive strategies that advocate for a systemic shift that nurtures not only technically proficient engineers, but also resilient innovators poised to address complex, real-world challenges sustainably. Further research is recommended to evaluate the long-term impact of this educational approach on professional competency in diverse engineering domains.