Collaborative Research: Development and Testing of a Fundamentals of Environmental Engineering Concept Inventory

该项目正在开发环境工程基础概念清单（FEECI），并在10所美国大学校园进行第一轮测试，这些大学都有必修的本科fei课程。项目目标还包括进一步完善FEECI及其传播。这项工作的预期结果是一个有效的、可靠的工具，用于评估土木和/或环境工程核心课程的概念理解。这种工具将在ABET标准下的项目认证评估中发挥重要作用，并为FEE课程的教学方法和教学框架的形成性评估提供必要的技术。另一个重要的成果将是发展团队的形成，这是一个强大的教师社区，他们接受了使用FEECI的培训，并致力于改善FEE教学。该项目的具体活动和里程碑包括：1。对FEECI开发团队的14名成员进行了在线Delphi研究，该团队由来自10所大学的教师组成，他们教授了多年的FEE课程。开发团队正在确定FEE中至关重要但容易被学生误解的概念；学生访谈和头脑风暴会议，从学生的角度生成关键概念列表（类似于教师生成列表的指导方针）；3. 3 .根据前两个里程碑整理的概念表和FEECI的一套选择题草稿；FEECI的最终测试版是在环境工程与科学教授协会（AEESP）夏季会议上开发团队成员的面对面会议上完成的。5 .分别于2011年秋季和2012年春季在10个校区的学生中试行FEECI；利用10所高校的数据对FEECI的效度和信度进行了统计分析；根据对测试数据的分析、学生访谈和专家同行评议，正在对FEECI问题草案进行完善；目前也正在编写文件，以便使用FEECI和指导解释其应用的结果。

This project is developing a Fundamentals of Environmental Engineering Concept Inventory (FEECI) and doing the first round of testing at ten US university campuses with required undergraduate FEE courses. Project goals also include further refinement of the FEECI and its dissemination. The expected outcome of this work is a validated, reliable instrument for assessing conceptual understanding in a core curriculum course for Civil and/or Environmental engineering. Such an instrument will play an important role in assessment for programmatic accreditation under the ABET standards, and provide a needed technique for formative assessment of instructional methods and pedagogical frameworks in the FEE curriculum. Another important outcome will be the formation of the Development Team, a strong community of faculty, trained in the use of the FEECI and dedicated to improving FEE instruction.Specific activities and milestones of this project include:1. On online Delphi study of 14 members of the FEECI Development Team - a group of faculty members from ten universities who have taught FEE courses for many years. The development team is determining the concepts in FEE that are critical but prone to misconception among students;2. Student interviews and brainstorming sessions to generate a list of critical concepts from the students' perspectives (similar to the guidelines for the faculty generated list); 3. A reconciled list of concepts based on the first two milestones and a draft set of multiple-choice questions for the FEECI;4. A finalized beta version of the FEECI completed during a face-to-face meeting of the Development Team members at the Association of Environmental Engineering & Science Professors (AEESP) summer meeting;5. A trial use of the FEECI to students at ten campuses in fall 2011 and spring 2012;6. A statistical analysis of validity and reliability of the FEECI using data from the ten participating universities;The draft FEECI questions are being refined based on analysis of test data, student interviews, and expert peer review; Documentation is also being prepared for using the FEECI and guiding the interpretation of the results of its application.