Expanding Technological Literacy through Engineering Minors

通过工程未成年人扩大技术素养

• 批准号: 0920164
• 负责人: Mani Mina
• 金额: $ 25万
• 依托单位: Iowa State University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2009
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2009-09-15 至 2014-08-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=0920164&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Expanding; Technological; Literacy; through; Engineering

Many Americans lack even a rudimentary understanding of the principles underlying the technology essential for daily life. Engineering concepts are pervasive in decision making within industry, government, education, and health care; yet most decisions in these sectors are made by people with little or no formal engineering education. This research is taking first steps to develop a template for a Minor in Engineering Studies as an approach to developing technological competence in non-engineers. It is a collaboration involving Iowa State University, Ohio State University, Hope College, and Rice University that is building on promising but small-scale results achieved in the Minor in Engineering Studies Program at Iowa State University and building on engineering courses for nonmajors that are in place at the partner institutions. The Minor in Engineering Studies at Iowa State has attracted students majoring in business, communications, journalism, and design. A key question being investigated is whether a minor can be defined in terms of technological literacy skills rather than a set of common courses. The ultimate goal is to develop a set of technological literacy objectives and outcomes for a Minor in Engineering Studies. These outcomes would be similar to the ABET a-k outcomes that are used for engineering degrees, but focused on developing technologically literate citizens rather than design engineers. The use of a standard set of outcomes rather than a standard series of courses would allow greater flexibility for each institution to develop a Minor in Engineering Studies that is best suited to its local conditions and existing courses (similar to the way engineering departments meet the ABET a-k requirements for engineering degrees). First steps entail establishing more clearly the value of an engineering minor, by determining student skills that result from current activities, and determining current students' and employers' perceived values of a minor in engineering. This project will also develop and test a set of common assessment methods for desired technological literacy outcomes. Developing the technological literacy outcomes and assessment methods simultaneously helps to insure that the outcomes are measurable and centered on student learning. Available assessment methods would facilitate the adoption of the outcomes by other engineering educators. Built-in assessment will also keep participants focused on course design that reflects best practices in engineering teaching and learning.

许多美国人甚至对日常生活中必不可少的技术的基本原理缺乏基本的了解。工程概念在工业、政府、教育和医疗保健的决策中无处不在;然而，这些部门的大多数决策都是由很少或没有受过正式工程教育的人做出的。这项研究正在采取第一步，开发一个模板，在工程研究的未成年人作为一种方法，以发展非工程师的技术能力。这是一个涉及爱荷华州州立大学，俄亥俄州州立大学，霍普学院和赖斯大学的合作，是建立在有前途的，但小规模的成果，在工程研究计划取得的未成年人在爱荷华州州立大学和建设工程课程的非专业是在地方的合作机构。在工程研究在爱荷华州未成年人吸引了学生主修商业，通信，新闻和设计。正在调查的一个关键问题是，未成年人是否可以根据技术扫盲技能而不是一套共同的课程来定义。 最终目标是为工程研究未成年人制定一套技术素养目标和成果。这些成果将类似于用于工程学位的ABET a-k成果，但侧重于培养技术素养的公民，而不是设计工程师。使用一套标准的成果，而不是一系列标准的课程将允许每个机构更大的灵活性，以开发最适合当地条件和现有课程的工程研究未成年人（类似于工程部门满足工程学位的ABET a-k要求的方式）。第一步需要更清楚地建立一个工程未成年人的价值，通过确定学生的技能，从当前的活动，并确定当前的学生和雇主的未成年人在工程的感知价值。 该项目还将制定和测试一套共同评估方法，以取得预期的技术扫盲成果。 同时开发技术素养成果和评估方法有助于确保成果是可衡量的并以学生学习为中心。现有的评估方法将有助于其他工程教育工作者采用的结果。 内置的评估还将使参与者专注于反映工程教学和学习最佳实践的课程设计。