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ContentsCURRICULUM INNOVATION FOR ENGINEERING
FRESHMEN AND SOPHOMORES
ABSTRACT
New Jersey Institute of Technology has witnessed an improved retention rate of freshman students in the past two years. Reasons for these positive changes include curriculum changes and incorporation of new teaching methodologies. Freshman students are more motivated to learn about engineering and to be successful in their studies because they learn to work in teams, research information, and apply engineering tools to solving open ended problems. Involving the students in their learning process through enhanced active learning methods has resulted in improved interest and participation in their engineering education.
INTRODUCTION
A change in curriculum has produced an introductory sequence of engineering courses paired with a humanities and social science course based on creative thinking, speaking and writing. The course introduces the new engineering student at NJIT to the various engineering disciplines and to selected design and manufacturing processes that engineers experience in industry. The course is taught by a team of professors representing the various traditional engineering departments who facilitate multidiscipline projects related to their areas of expertise. Freshman students work through these projects in teams of three or four with an emphasis on active learning. Students learn by doing and by researching topics relevant to their project.
New Jersey Institute of Technology is one of ten engineering schools who are partners in the Gateway Engineering Education Coalition, supported in part by the Engineering Education and Centers Division of the National Science Foundation that began in 1992.
During 1991, initial planning sessions of the ten Gateway Coalition partner schools identified Curriculum Innovation and Development (and design) as a principle area of interest to all partners. Thus, NJIT placed a high priority on curricular innovations with special emphasis on the freshman engineering program. This priority was motivated by desires to alleviate retention problems identified at many engineering schools. Improvement of engineering design throughout the curriculum has been a popular topic in many engineering education meetings and other interested groups. In particular, the Manufacturing Studies Board of the National Research Council issued a timely report entitled Improving Engineering Education[1]. The Manufacturing Studies Board includes industrial leaders and academicians and several recommendations and comments are most appropriate for development of engineering design courses. As our Board has commented, "Design education is clearly weak; it must receive increased emphasis and introduce modern design practices if it is to educate engineers who will contribute to the drive towards greater industrial competitiveness."
The first four NSF Engineering Education Coalitions (SYNTHESIS and ECSEL, in 1990, and SUCCEED and GATEWAY in 1992) suggested that freshman design was an important area focusing on improved engineering education and listed design and the freshman year as priority areas.
During 1991-1992, the efforts for the first year of the Gateway Coalition at NJIT focused on planning the freshman design course and included exploration of the various modalities used to teach freshman engineering design at other schools. In particular, parts of other partners' freshman engineering curricula were reviewed, and where appropriate, adapted for use in the NJIT freshman design course. A faculty committee with representation of mathematics, physics, chemistry, humanities, social science, and all engineering departments was formed and began considering possible incorporation of an engineering design experience in the freshman year. The freshman year curriculum is common to all NJIT engineering students. The existing course EG 101, Engineering Graphics, was selected as an appropriate candidate for revision and upgrading. The Committee considered several Gateway models and after careful deliberations proposed a replacement course, Fundamentals of Engineering Design, FED 101, which would retain most of the basic graphics content of EG 101, but changed course teaching methodology to provide learning of skills during the process of working through engineering design modules. Instead of following chapters in a text for the purpose of learning a specific body of knowledge and testing students to determine how well the information was retained, an improved approach was developed. Thus, freshman students now become part of a design team working on a deliverable. In developing a solution to the design problem, a variety of skills are learned "just in time," often termed "concurrent engineering." Thus, when students need to produce drawings, a CAD program is learned and used. If students need to collect data and arrive at some conclusions, some simple principles of statistics are learned and used. The faculty committee developed modules in order to provide the student teams with realistic design learning experiences. Each module focuses on one or several traditional engineering fields. NJIT's resources such as: laboratories containing testing equipment, chemical analysis equipment, machine shops, robotics labs, among others, are available to freshman students. Also, a recently built computer room equipped with modern Sun workstations is designated for freshman use to design in solid modeling software and export files to a Stereolithography Apparatus (SLA) for prototypes.
The original intent of the FED 101 course at NJIT was to offer one project covering all major areas of engineering. However, the logistics of teaching schedules for team teaching and the type of project has varied over time and is still evolving. In the interim, each of the individual modules offers a unique project pertinent to that discipline, yet all have a common goal. That goal is to have the students work together as a team while using some creativity in solving a typical engineering problem. The students are also exposed to decision making, time management, data collection and analysis, concurrent engineering, manufacturing, quality assurance, and even marketing strategies while at the same time practicing and enhancing their communication skills. Most of all, the students are learning about working together as a team while solving engineering problems through hands-on experience. A primary objective in each module offered is to motivate the students to be creative in their approach to solutions for any particular problem. Emphasis is on the entire engineering process from the initial problem description and objective through the final problem solution that may involve many aspects of analysis relevant to that particular engineering discipline. The faculty are there to facilitate the work of the students with minimal time spent on formal lectures. Instead, individual group discussions bolster the student teams through their decision making process.
During the 1992-1993 academic year, a core group of professors representing three of the engineering disciplines worked together in planning the Fundamentals of Engineering Design course. The outcome of their efforts resulted in four pilot sections of the FED 101 course being taught in fall 1993 and four in spring 1994. This totaled approximately 136 incoming first-time, full-time, freshman engineering students. The course had eight professors representing the Civil, Electrical, and Mechanical Engineering disciplines. A seven week civil engineering module was followed or preceded by a seven week electrical engineering module taught concurrently with a fourteen week mechanical/manufacturing engineering module. Thus, students enrolled in FED 101 met six hours a week with eight different professors, learning and participating as teams in three different projects.
This team effort includes not only the engineering disciplines, but also includes the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences. The FED 101 course has been paired with a new Humanities and Social Science course, HSS 101. The sections of students taking FED 101 are kept together in the HSS 101 course. The HSS 101 professors work very closely with the FED professors and this collaboration integrates material presented in the two courses. For example the topics presented in the FED modules are matched to reading and discussion assignments in the HSS course. The HSS professors also help the students with creative thinking, technical writing skills in the preparation of the final written reports, and communication skills in preparation for show how the fundamental engineering science background is relevant to engineering design; oral presentations required in each of the FED 101 modules.
Professionals from industry were invited as guest speakers to present lectures on several topics, to enhance student understanding about an engineering career. For example, industrial design and sketch renditions presented by a professional designer and owner of his own consulting business; safety in design presented by a certified safety expert; copyrights and patents of original designs discussed by a patent attorney who is a board member of NJIT; design of prosthetic devices for human limbs presented by a technician from the Kestrel Institute for Rehabilitation; and a discussion of consulting in engineering by a distinguished NJIT professor.
ADVANCEMENTS IN CURRICULUM CHANGES
During the summer of 1996, the team teaching concept continued as the team of professors worked to develop projects that cross all engineering disciplines with inclusion of humanities, social sciences, economics and management. The inverted curriculum and course integration was supported by the Technology Reinvestment Project funded by NSF. The focus of including manufacturing across the curriculum had the team of professors developing a second course in Fundamentals of Engineering for a two semester sequence of FE 101 and FE 102. This sequence included more computer applications to enhance students' skills in the use of their own PC's and UNIX workstations in the freshman computer laboratories, introduced the students to materials and manufacturing processes, highlighted economics, effect on environment, and social impact as engineering concerns.
The pilot course was offered in the 1996 - 1997 academic year to four sections of students. There were four different multidiscipline projects tested over the fall and spring semesters. The following describes each of those projects and outlines the faculty involved in the facilitation of those projects.
One mechanical and electrical engineering project analyzes and redesigns a typical lawn sprinkler. One member of the faculty team has expertise in plastic processing and discusses material choices for the lawn sprinkler. The gear mechanism is handled by another member of the faculty team teaching the students how to use CAD software in designing the gears. A third member of the faculty team from the Industrial Engineering Department helps the students to develop the Quality Function Deployment methodology (QFD) for the best choice in design.
Another project involves mechanical engineering coupled with electrical engineering as students analyze a floppy disk drive. Students learn about the circuitry to run the drive as well as the fabrication of the front panel.
Electrical and biomedical engineering pair up for a third project that has students study the apparatus that tests electrocardiograph equipment. A physician, as a guest speaker, informs the students about the heart signal and how it is monitored with an ECG. Students visit a company that manufactures the testing device and observe how it functions.
Students read city maps and learn about a waste treatment facility in a fourth project involving chemical, civil, and environment engineering. The faculty team is comprised of five faculty members having expertise in several areas of site selection, chemical processes, and environmental impact. Students do a feasibility study on several suggested sites for the waste treatment facility and decide which is best suited and most cost affective with least impact on the community.
Each of the engineering projects is paired with a course in humanities and social sciences to assist the students with brain storming strategies of their engineering projects, writing skills for their final reports and oral communication practice for their final team oral presentations at the end of the term.
SURVEY RESULTS AND STUDENT FEEDBACK
Formal and informal student feedback on the course work (and described in their oral reports) indicate that students consistently show enthusiasm about this new learning process. The course is very different from their high school experience, and definitely requires a student mind set change. However, students quickly realize that they are very much responsible for their own education.
In some cases, it has been difficult for students to adapt to the flexibility in the classroom structure. Students are encouraged to speak up and ask questions of faculty, to pose possible solutions to project ideas, to query their peers on responses made to other questions, and to consider alternate solutions to problems that arise while working on modules. Students are often surprised to learn that their ideas and input count and are taken seriously.
In many cases, it has also been difficult for some of the students to adapt to the amount of responsibility placed on them. In each of the modules, different stages of the project have deadlines set. If students meet these deadlines, they realize that the work goes smoothly and the project will be finished on time. Thus, students learn that the work is progressive and each piece of the project is dependent on the completion of the part before it. A certain continuity becomes evident. If deadlines are not met, they become pressured to "catch up" in order to complete the entire project. In one module, the milestones are presented to them electronically through a home page on the World Wide Web. This medium was chosen as a way to introduce the students to the electronic network and to help them become more resourceful and gain self confidence.
Several results have been observed using this approach. One is teaching time management. Budgeting time and work is basic to any student's success in college and later as a professional in industry. Students are juggling all their freshman courses and learning to prioritize. They are encouraged to budget their time based on the various phases of the project and meeting intermediate deadlines as the project progresses. Another result is that students learn that any or all material learned is important for success in arriving at results. In a traditional course, it may be possible for a student to slide through one or two chapters of the textbook and perform average on one of four exams and still do well in the course. In the FED and FE courses, the project determines the bulk of the final grade. Since the work is cumulative and progressive, any errors committed during their research, design, or analysis could result in erroneous conclusions on their final report. Student experience working as a member of a team is also a valuable feature of the course. Students learn that they can find each other's strengths and learn to pool their unique talents. They learn to delegate tasks and to monitor each other because their final grade depends on the work produced by each individual team member. As expressed by one student, "We accomplished the goal at hand. That, perhaps, is the most important lesson we learned, to succeed."
Herein lies the motivation: the need to succeed. This course presents the students with an opportunity to be successful because there is always a conclusion or a final product at the end of the term. This goal presents the students with an objective and a challenge. They can find their own ways to be successful and to accomplish the end results expected of them. They learn to work together as a team. They learn to research and obtain information necessary to meet their objective. They learn to be resourceful. They learn to challenge each other in competitive ways to out do the other teams. The motivation is there. The result is always a good feeling of what they have accomplished.
HUMANITIES AND SOCIAL SCIENCES INTEGRATED
For the past five years, the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences has worked to transform its GUR program. This effort, funded by the NSF Gateway Coalition and the Technology Reinvestment Program, has now been completed. The total number of credits in the Humanities/Social Science GUR has not been changed, and the credits devoted to English Composition (3 credits), Cultural History (6 credits), Basic Social Science (6 credits), and Upper Division Electives (9 credits) remain the same. We have, however, have revised the courses that make up those divisions of the GUR. These initiatives give a unique and distinctive character to NJIT's educational experience, a character that reflects the shifts made in the engineering curriculum.
SUMMARY OF THE NEW HSS CORE CURRICULUM
HSS 101 (Writing, Speaking, Thinking) replaces English 111, a traditional course in composition. The new course emphasizes written and oral communication skills and critical thinking with special applications to the students' professional goals. Sections of HSS 101 are paired with FED 101, the new freshman engineering design course.
HSS 202 (Society, Technology, and the Environment) becomes NJIT's primary Basic Social Science course, along with the presently required course in economics (described below). HSS 202 uses a multidisciplinary approach to case studies of important current issues in social science, while reinforcing the communications skills taught in HSS 101.
HSS 211 (The Pre-Modern World), 212 (The Twentieth Century World), 213 (The World and the West) replace HUM 112 and HUM 231. Instead of two required courses in cultural history, students may now choose two of three courses dealing with the ancient and medieval world, the pre-modern world, and the 20th Century. Instead of a historical survey approach, the new courses are thematic in structure, with emphasis on the development of culture from a global perspective.
The three upper-division electives encourage students to pursue areas of special interest, with two broadly-based 300-level courses from a variety of disciplines followed by a 400-level capstone seminar in which each student brings the knowledge and skills learned in previous HSS courses to bear on the study of a specific topic in the humanities and/or social sciences.
Common pedagogical strategies running throughout the new curriculum include collaborative learning, critical thinking, a deep level of engagement with course material, and consistent emphasis on written and oral communication. Syllabi for all HSS core GUR courses will be available on the web for review by students, other faculty and accreditation agencies. Assessment of student progress and of program effectiveness is measured through traditional course structures and student portfolios, which will include written work from all courses within the HSS curriculum.
Each segment of the new curriculum was approved in pilot form by a departmental committee, by the department as a whole, and by the university's Undergraduate Curriculum Review Committee prior to being offered. Experience with pilot sections led to modifications in form and content, especially in the lower-division components. The entire new curriculum was subsequently reviewed and endorsed by the HSS Department (Nov. 6, 1996), by UCRC (Dec. 2, 1996), and by university's Committee on Academic Affairs (Dec. 4, 1996). Although the changes do not alter the basic GUR credit requirements, they do represent a significant change in the way NJIT students will experience their core curriculum courses in the humanities and social sciences. Our curriculum transformation would not have been possible without the support of our colleagues in Newark College of Engineering.
MANAGEMENT AND ECONOMICS INTEGRATED FOR ENGINEERS
The impact of changes in the global business environment upon engineering education has been fully appreciated by NJIT. In order to provide engineering students the integrated knowledge of engineering and management, NJIT has made some changes in its education programs in economics and management. Firstly, at NJIT, students of conventional engineering programs may choose management as their minor field. In order to fulfill the requirement, these students will have to take 21 credit of managerial courses, which include the following seven courses: (1) Principles of Accounting or Accounting for Managerial Control; (2) Principles of Financial Management; (3) Management of Information Systems; (4) Principles of Management; (5) Principles of Marketing; (6) Management Science; and (7) Economics. If an engineering student takes another minor option in their undergraduate degree plan, they are still required to take at least one economics and one management course as a part of their social science and management requirements.
However, until recently, when engineering students enroll in traditional economics and management courses with business and social science students, the overall emphasis of teaching is somewhat abstract and typically reflects either social issues or financial corporate environments which are more suitable for social science and business related education respectively. Such courses, although comprehensive, fail to train engineering managers adequately in comprehending the practical management aspects of technology based companies. An initiative is underway at the New Jersey Institute of Technology to emphasize the inter relationship of the materials covered by the Principle of Management and Economics courses. These two courses have been re-designed as a joint curriculum in order to overcome the shortcomings of the traditional curriculum and teaching in these areas. This effort is part of a TRP grant program from the National Science Foundation.
Several features of the integration of the Economics and Management courses are noticeable departures from the previous teaching of the two courses. First, a scenario type game is played the first week in an attempt to establish a baseline of student knowledge in the field of management and economics. The same game is played at the end of the first semester sequence of the two course and is planned to be replayed at the end of the second semester. A detailed analysis of the findings is given in the next section. Second, where most texts and courses in economics end with the area of International Economics, the integrated course begins with the Global issues. For example, the introduction of supply and demand theories are applied to international trade and foreign exchange rates and the significance of trade as well as exchange rates, to managers is then demonstrated.
ASSESSMENT APPROACH OF INTEGRATED CURRICULA
In order to base an additional assessment of student achievement, regarding the new curriculum, other than classroom participation and testing, the following scenario was developed and presented to the students at the beginning of the first semester of the two-semester sequence of Economics and Management:
A manufacturer of plastic kitchen bowls and containers is not able to meet the market demand for its products; even though it has continually raised the price of its products. It is considering a major increase in production; either by a new plant in the United States or an overseas facility. The company has been very fortunate due to the fact that there have been many returns of its product because of defects; and yet, it sales still have increased. Despite its growing revenues, the company is in a precarious financial position due to its large debt-to-equity ratio. Also its Chief Financial Officer recently suffered a stroke and his position as yet remained unfilled. Fortunately, the company enjoys good relations with the employees and their union. A new three year contract with the union was just signed calling for wage increases equal to cost-of-living increases.
The students were primarily engineering students and all were either in the Freshman or Sophomore years. The students were divided into groups of four members each and worked on their respective analyses of the scenario and its attendant questions for a period of two weeks. At the last two weeks of the semester, the reports, which were collected, were given back to the groups. They were requested to make any changes, additions, deletions or revisions of any type that they might feel necessary in view of the semester's work.
The summary results of evaluating the student's reports are as follows:
1. Virtually all the groups were able to delineate the problems of:
2. Also, the strengths of the company were easily discerned by the groups; for example
The students were then asked what to do about the problems and what course of action should the company employ and what are the bases for their decisions. It is in this part of the analyses that the results were somewhat disappointing and yet enlightening. First, to the disappointment: the students readily recognized the problems; but their response to the problems was, at best, trivial. They all were appalled by the large debt-to-equity ratio and their solution to the problem was "that the large debt-to-equity ratio has to be reduced." Or the students were equally dismayed at the large number of defects in the production of the products. However, only around 20 percent of the students were able to apply the theoretical aspects of the course such as elasticity of demand, costs of production, and different models of international enterprise and management, to the scenario. Based on our own scoring on the answers as they relate to the appropriate theory, we found that on average the class had a score of 74 or C which was less than our enthusiastic expectation.
It may well be that the course content is too demanding (e.g. the one semester covers both macro and micro economics along with inputs from finance and management). The management course sequence is also very ambitious as to content. Students are taught to think as a multi-function manager. First, they are trained to evaluate projects from a financial analyst's perspective (cost-benefit analysis). They are taught also to think from the perspectives of a product manager and human resources manger in a global economy; employing management decision criteria during innovation and technical changes.
Each student is assigned a technology based industry as a case study at the beginning of the semester. As each segment of financial, marketing, and management theory is taught, students are asked to relate the issues to their respective companies through in class analysis, data gathering using SEC information available in the library, and in some cases through interviewing appropriate personnel. All students are required to analyze all aspects of the theory taught in the class to their projects; however detailed attention is given to one particular area of the materials covered in class (e.g. product planning or product marketing).
The students are given several basic financial valuation problems as home work assignments. A case study (similar to a Harvard Case Study approach) that tests a student's ability to decide for a particular project whether management should lease machinery or purchase them is also included. Both projects are due at the end of the semester. These assignments are required in addition to the course tests of mid-term and final examinations. The course is team taught and at the present time; the instructors are assessing their first experience of the integrated model.
The combining of two courses, each given by a separate unit of a university is a bold and innovative advance in higher education. In this case - the Basic Economics course and the Basic Management course at the New Jersey Institute of Technology - have been integrated with a measure of success. Certain problems and challenges have arisen which will be met in the coming semesters by redesign of course content and instructional materials. The emphasis of the integrated courses has been broadened to include manufacturing and industrial concerns as well as social and policy issues.
The faculty involved with the re-design effort has been continually required to assess the approach to the integrated courses as well as curriculum changes as the course work progress. As the integration proceeds in the forthcoming semesters, the integration will become somewhat of a natural process. We would be remiss if acknowledgment was not made to the National Science Foundation for their support in this pioneering effort. The returns to this educational program will accrue for many years to come and contribute to the education of American engineers in a profound and positive manner.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Geraldine Milano wishes to acknowledge the contributions which made this paper complete. Dr. George Pincus and the late Dr. Richard Parker were the initial pioneers of the innovative changes in the NCE curriculum and collaborators with Geraldine Milano on a paper published in the ASEE proceedings, June, 1996 discussing results of their endeavors.
New Jersey Institute of Technology expresses sincere appreciation for the opportunity to enhance their curriculum through the benefits of the Gateway Engineering Education Coalition grant program, Grant EEC 9109853, and the Technology Reinvestment Project, Department of Transportation, Grant DMI 9413088, funded in part by the National Science Foundation. This material is based upon work supported by Gateway and the TRP. Any opinions, findings, conclusions or recommendations expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation or the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.
Congratulations and sincere appreciation are extended to all the faculty involved during the development and implementation stages of the enhanced curriculum changes. The faculty worked together diligently over the past several years to share ideas and overlap disciplines in coordinating the numerous multidiscipline projects that were developed under the NSF funded grants through the Gateway Coalition and the Technology Reinvestment Project. Many thanks to all of them. Without their contributions, camaraderie, dedication, and sense of humor, this would not have been possible.
REFERENCE
Manufacturing Studies Board of the National Research Council Report "Improving Engineering Education," National Research Council, Washington, D.C., 1991.