Research Initiation Grant: Defining Success for Undergraduate Research Experiences by Non-Elite Engineering Students

参与本科生研究经常被认为是一种提高学生在某一学科中的留存率的机制，也是一种激励更多学生攻读研究生的手段。过去的研究集中在研究本科生的研究经验对成绩优异的学生的影响？但这些学生已经有可能毕业，更有可能攻读研究生课程。由于非精英学生经常面临着离开工程专业的风险，而且与成绩优异的学生相比，他们不太可能继续攻读研究生课程，因此，这个拟议的项目开始了一项关于参加普通工科课程的好处的研究。工科学生在他们的教育和专业发展方面。这一研究启动项目的主要重点是为不同类型的学生制定成功的定义，通过对学生的学术和个人背景进行分类来确定类别。在确定了定义之后，威斯康星大学密尔沃基分校(UWM)参与工程研究活动的本科生中具有代表性的一部分本科生将进行一项试点研究，以确认成功定义的适当性。这项工作的智力价值在于它扩大了对普通工科学生的益处的研究？为了增加美国培养的工程师数量，培养一批学生到毕业是很重要的。通过为广泛的学生确定成功参与城市再教育的适当定义，然后在一项试点研究中测试这些定义，该项目开始确定更大比例的工科学生更多地参与城市再教育是否有用和适当。此外，这个项目开始确定URE中对不同学生群体最有益的要素。这项工作的更广泛的影响是有可能显著影响工科本科生未来的研究经验方向。通过确定对不同类型的学生和研究项目的不同期望，该项目为工程教育工作者提供了对未来工程师教育和准备的本科生研究的现实期望。

Participation in undergraduate research has often been presented as a mechanism to improve student retention in a discipline and as a means to inspire more students to pursue graduate studies. Past studies have concentrated on studying the effects of undergraduate research experiences (UREs) on high-achieving students ? but these students are already likely to graduate and are more likely to pursue graduate studies. Because non-elite students are often at risk for leaving engineering programs and are less likely to pursue graduate studies than high-achieving students, the proposed project begins a study of the benefits of participation in UREs for ?average? engineering students with respect to their educational and professional development. The primary focus of this research initiation project is developing definitions of success for different types of students, with categories determined through classification of the academic and personal background of the students. Following the determination of the definitions, a pilot study involving a representative fraction of undergraduate students who participate in engineering research activities at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) is to be conducted to confirm the appropriateness of the definitions of success.The intellectual merit of this work is that it expands the study of the benefits of UREs to average engineering students ? a population of students that it is important to nurture through to graduation in order to increase the number of engineers produced in the United States. By determining appropriate definitions of success of URE participation for a wide range of students and then testing the definitions in a pilot study, this project begins to determine if increasing URE participation to a larger percentage of engineering students is useful and appropriate. Furthermore, this project begins to identify the elements of a URE that are most beneficial for different groups of students. The broader impact of this work is the potential to significantly influence the future directions of research experiences of undergraduate engineering students. By determining different expectations for various types of students and research programs, this project provides engineering educators with realistic expectations of undergraduate research on the education and preparation of future engineers.