Collaborative Research: Teaching Engineering Design with a Contextual Perspective

这个项目旨在通过提高学生对社会、文化、经济和政治制度如何影响他们的工程设计的理解来服务于国家利益。传统上，工程设计课程主要侧重于设计的技术规范和要求，而没有充分考虑它们将在更广泛的背景下使用。在典型的工程课程的中间两年，也缺乏工程设计课程。这导致学生在第一门设计课程和最终的顶峰设计课程之间存在着学习设计原则和技能的差距。该项目计划为伊利诺伊大学芝加哥分校和德克萨斯大学圣安东尼奥分校的二年级和三年级学生开发、实施、改进和评估工程设计课程。这些课程应该帮助学生学习如何使用工程设计的历史和当前例子来深入分析设计选择对社会的影响。该项目旨在为工程专业的中期课程开发一个教学框架以及这些课程的教学材料。通过访谈和学生调查，该项目将评估课程对学生的影响。项目结果将通过专业发展工作室传播给工程教育工作者。本项目的目标是帮助学生学习如何在工程设计过程中考虑社会、文化、经济和政治因素。这个项目是以批判意识理论为基础的，该理论建议学生需要发展一种意识，因为工程设计决策可能会导致不公平的社会状况。将在中期制定和完善新的工程设计教学框架，使工程设计包括背景视角。新的工程设计课程的目标是：(1)使学生成为更具社会性和批判性的工程师，(2)帮助学生从批判意识的角度了解工程设计过程，以及(3)帮助学生在追求工程职业的抱负中获得认可。本课程将使用小组间对话的方法来建立沟通关系，促进对话，并鼓励学生之间的合作。本研究将解决两个研究问题：(1)在工程设计课程中，什么教学策略最有助于培养学生的批判意识？(2)项目的程序性特征如何以及以何种方式影响学生的工程设计学习和工程认同发展？项目团队将使用定量和定性的方法来分析课堂观察、课程人工制品和学生调查的数据。NSF IUSE：EHR计划支持研究和开发项目，以提高所有学生的STEM教育的有效性。通过参与的学生学习路径，该计划支持有前景的实践和工具的创建、探索和实施。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This project aims to serve the national interest by improving students’ understanding of how social, cultural, economic, and political systems can inform their engineering designs. Traditionally, engineering design courses have focused primarily on the technical specifications and requirements of a design without full consideration of the wider context in which they will be used. There is also a lack of engineering design courses in the middle two years of a typical engineering curriculum. This leads to a gap in learning design principles and skills for students between their first design course and the final capstone design course. The project plans to develop, implement, refine, and evaluate engineering design courses for second and third year students at the University of Illinois-Chicago and the University of Texas-San Antonio. The courses should help students learn how to conduct in-depth analyses of the implications of design choices for society using historical and current examples of engineering design. This project intends to develop an instructional framework for the middle years of engineering programs' courses along with instructional materials for those courses. Using interviews and student surveys, the project will assess the impact of the courses on students. Project results will be disseminated to engineering educators through professional development workshops.The goal of this project is to help students learn how to consider social, cultural, economic, and political factors during the engineering design process. This project is based on Critical Consciousness theory which suggests that students need to develop an awareness of inequitable societal conditions that can occur due to engineering design decisions. A new teaching framework for engineering design in the middle years will be developed and refined so that engineering design includes a contextual perspective. The goals for the new engineering design course are: (1) to empower students to be more socially and critically driven engineers, (2) to help students learn about the engineering design process from a Critical Consciousness perspective, and (3) to help students become validated in their aspirations to pursue an engineering career. An inter-group dialogue approach will be used in the course to establish communication relationships, facilitate dialogue, and encourage collaborations between students. This study will address two research questions: (1) What teaching strategies are most helpful in developing students’ critical consciousness through an engineering design course? (2) How and in what ways do the programmatic features of the project impact students’ learning of engineering design and engineering identity development? The project team will use quantitative and qualitative methods to analyze data from classroom observations, course artifacts, and student surveys. The NSF IUSE: EHR Program supports research and development projects to improve the effectiveness of STEM education for all students. Through the Engaged Student Learning track, the program supports the creation, exploration, and implementation of promising practices and tools.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.