Research Initiation Grant: Social Justice in Engineering with a Focus on Control Systems

技术描述：这项研究启动资助的重点是工程和社会正义，特别是在科罗拉多矿业学院电气和机械工程专业学生所需的控制系统课程中。采用混合方法，该团队将首先评估初高中学生的社会正义意识状态，这将提供有关其在课程其他地方存在的信息。在对所有在校生进行调查之后，将对选定的学生进行焦点小组和半结构化访谈。然后，该小组将评估在本课程中实施的社会正义干预措施的影响。为球队的最佳表现干杯？根据我们的知识，这项研究将代表社会正义第一次在控制系统工程中具体地框架，这将有助于扩大对社会正义的理解，因为它与这一特定的工程学科有关。其次，本研究将收集这些机电工程专业学生的基线信息。有工程和社会公正方面的经验。这一基本信息将为将来教授社会正义所需的课程变化提供重要的背景。最后，本研究包括对社会正义干预在必修控制系统课程中的影响的评估，通过评估所使用的教学技术的有效性，为工程教育研究界做出贡献。对意义/重要性的非技术解释：社会正义的概念没有一个简洁、普遍的定义，但从根本上讲是关于人权的。社会正义所蕴涵的愿景是，人民和社区有权享有平等、健康、尊严和机会。社会公正与保护自然环境密切相关，因为公平地获得清洁的水、清洁的空气和地球？美国的资源是人权的重要组成部分。社会公正是“可持续性三角”的关键要素，经济和环境构成了另外两个轴。然而，尽管经济学长期以来一直被认为是工程教育的重要组成部分，近年来环境也取得了重大进展，但在典型的工程课程中，社会正义却很少受到关注。因此，大多数工程专业毕业生都没有准备好对他们的工程决策和设计的社会正义影响进行彻底的评估。拟议的研究将为弥补这一缺陷奠定基础。在2014年秋季和2015年秋季参加干预课程的大约50名学生将学习社会正义概念，因此将更好地考虑他们的工程决策的社会影响。理想情况下，这些学生将在未来的职业生涯中成为社会正义的大使。该小组将与控制系统和社会正义教学社区分享其干预材料，从而增加更多学生了解这一重要领域的机会。研究活动也将补充CSM？i’辅修人道主义工程。此外，人种学研究表明，女性和其他少数族裔工程专业的学生不成比例地高度重视工程的人文方面，因此，有针对性的社会正义指导可能会影响他们毕业后继续从事这一职业的动机。

Technical description: The focus of this research initiation grant is engineering and social justice, specifically within a control systems course required for electrical and mechanical engineering students at the Colorado School of Mines. Using a mixed-methods approach, the team will begin by assessing the state of social justice awareness of the junior- and senior-level students entering the class, which will provide information about its presence elsewhere in the curriculum. A survey offered to all enrolled students will be followed by focus groups and semi-structured interviews for selected students. This team will then evaluate the impacts of social justice interventions that are implemented in this course. To the best of the team?s knowledge, this research will represent the first time social justice is framed specifically within control systems engineering, which will help to expand understanding of social justice as it relates to this specific engineering discipline. Second, this research will collect baseline information of these electrical and mechanical engineering students? prior experiences with engineering and social justice. This baseline information will provide important background for future curricular changes required to teach social justice. Finally, this research includes an evaluation of the impact of social justice interventions within a required control systems course, contributing to the engineering education research community by evaluating the effectiveness of the pedagogical techniques used.Non-technical explanation of significance/importance: The concept of social justice defies a concise, universal definition, but is fundamentally about human rights. The vision implied in social justice is that people and communities have the right to equality, to health, to dignity, and to opportunities. Social justice is closely tied to care for the natural environment because equitable access to clean water, clean air, and Earth?s resources is an important element of human rights. Social justice is a key element of the "sustainability triangle," with economics and the environment forming the other two axes. However, whereas economics has long been considered an important part of engineering education and the environment has gained significant ground in recent years, social justice receives very little attention within typical engineering curricula. Therefore, most engineering graduates are unprepared to perform thorough assessments of the social justice implications of their engineering decisions and designs. The proposed research will lay the groundwork to remedy this shortcoming. The approximately 50 students enrolled in the intervention courses during fall 2014 and fall 2015 will learn social justice concepts and will therefore be better equipped to consider social impacts of their engineering decisions. Ideally, these students will become ambassadors for social justice within their future careers. The team will share its intervention materials with the control systems and social justice teaching communities, thereby increasing the opportunity for additional students to learn about this important area. The research activities will also complement those of CSM?s Humanitarian Engineering minor. In addition, ethnographic research suggests that women and other minority engineering students disproportionately place a high priority on the human side of engineering, so targeted instruction in social justice may impact their motivation to continue in the profession beyond graduation.