Collaborative Research: Investigating the Innovation Capabilities of Undergraduate Engineering Students

这个由德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校(授予博士学位的大学)和马萨诸塞大学达特茅斯分校(授予硕士学位的机构)合作的项目正在调查本科工程学课程对本科工程学学生创新能力的影响。两所大学的机械工程系都在研究学生的创新能力，寻找他们的课程与创新能力变化之间的相关性。本研究的目的是确定本科工科课程在多大程度上提高研究生的创新能力。该项目正在建立测量学生创新能力的工具，包括学生解决开放式设计问题的概念生成练习和调查学生创造性自我效能感的调查。这些工具包含用于评估学生设计的原创性水平和技术可行性的指标，并被用来确定整个本科课程和个别课程(例如，面向设计的课程)对学生创新能力的影响。这是通过在课程的入口点和出口点以及选定课程的开始和结束时评估学生的创新能力来实现的。这项研究还将创新能力与学生的技术表现联系起来，这是通过学生的成绩点数来衡量的。因为这项工作是在非常不同的学生群体中进行的，所以这项工作将对全国产生影响。该项目的主要贡献包括评估创新能力的工具和更好地了解工程学课程与创新工程师培养之间的关系。

This collaborative project between the University of Texas at Austin (a PhD granting university) and the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth (an MS granting institution) is investigating the impact of undergraduate engineering curricula on the innovation capabilities of undergraduate engineering students. The mechanical engineering departments at both universities are studying innovation capability of students and looking for correlations between their curricula and changes in innovation ability. The goal of the research is to determine to what extent the undergraduate engineering curricula improve graduate innovation capability. The project is establishing instruments for measuring the innovation capability of students that consist of concept generation exercises where students solve open-ended design problems and a survey to investigate student creative self-efficacy. These instruments contain metrics for assessing the level of originality and technical feasibility of student designs and are being used to determine the effect the complete undergraduate curriculum and the effect of individual courses (design-oriented courses, for example) on student innovation capabilities. This is being accomplished by assessing student innovation capabilities at the entry and exit points of the curriculum and at the beginning and end of selected courses. The research is also correlating innovation capability with student technical performance as measured using the student's grade-point ratio. Because the work is being carried out using very distinct student populations, the work will have a national impact. Major contributions of the project include an instrument for assessing innovation capabilities and a better understanding of the relationship between engineering curricula and the development of innovative engineers.