A Broadening Participation in Engineering Workshop for Distance Learning Programs in STEM: Experiences, Challenges, and Solutions

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Nationally, STEM workforce shortages have increased the need to grow the number of engineering workers. This workforce demand is happening while the numbers and percentages of underrepresented and non-traditional students rapidly expands. To maintain the nation's technological competitive edge, universities are increasingly called upon to create innovative engineering and other STEM-related curricula, using distance learning to encompass broader participation in these fields, to diversify the growing technical workforce. Recent technological advances have the potential to allow the implementation of distance learning to reach larger numbers of students, especially those from underrepresented groups and non-traditional students. While the offerings of engineering programs through distance learning is increasing, these programs are not as widely used as in the humanities and social sciences. One primary reason is that the logical, analytical and mathematical nature of the material and the associated hands-on components require face-to-face discussion and explanation. For the proposed project, the investigators outline a workshop that will encourage faculty to consider which aspects of their curriculum can be offered in an entirely online mode or blended with traditional pedagogies. This project intends to provide a forum for faculty, particularly those from public Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs), to understand the means for migrating engineering courses to a distance learning mode. Participants will have the opportunity to interact with distance learning experts. Workshop participants will have the opportunity to design distance learning courses and programs that meet current educational expectations. Generally speaking, the proposed workshop aims to spur faculty interest in developing distance learning programs to effectively to fit the needs of the curriculum and students, with the goal of achieving student learning outcomes. The interactive workshop enables faculty to work with experts to address considerations with online delivery modes. The outcomes of the workshop include: 1) a detailed workshop report with summaries and conclusions from each session; 2) a model for encouraging broader participation by faculty in online engineering and science courses; and 3) a report on workshop effectiveness.