CAREER: Personal Epistemology in Engineering Education

美国目前面临着许多挑战，从开发新能源到管理不断增加的医疗成本，这些挑战都需要新的解决方案。与此同时，技术变革的步伐正在迅速加快，因此，现有的工具和目前面临的挑战与几年后出现的挑战是不同的。因此，工程师的教育必须包括教他们以新的方式使用现有知识来解决意想不到的问题。这项研究调查了学生和工程师如何理解他们自己的知识，因此我们将能够更好地解决学生现有的知识模型，并帮助他们发展成为未来更敏捷、更高效的工程师。该项目的目标是了解学生的个人认识论（即他们对知道某事意味着什么的假设，以及什么是知识）如何通过他们在工程教育和实践中的经验发展。在学生学习、教授教学和管理人员不断改进的过程中，他们都是从自己的个人认识论出发，对知识和确定性是如何产生、共享和重新形成的做出基本假设。特别是，他们都对工程学的认识论和工程学认识方式的特征做出了假设。目前，关于工程实践的认识论假设在很大程度上是不言而喻和未经检验的。目前的研究表明，许多教师在不同的知识假设下工作，这些差异限制了他们朝着共同目标发展或合作的潜力。本项目将使用访谈和专题分析来揭示工程专业学生和教师的个人认识论，并帮助他们适应工程实践的认识论要求。核心利益相关者必须开发工具和资源来讨论他们自己和他人的个人认识论，以实现工程教育的目标，并确保这些目标始终以实现重大的社会利益为导向。这个项目的实际目标可以表达为四个具体目标：(1)表征工程学生和实践工程师的个人认识论；(2)批判性地分析学生个人认识论在工程教育和实践背景下的含义；(3)迭代开发、实施和评估工程内容课程中认识论学习的材料和方法；(4)在工程教育工作者和工程教育研究者之间发展对个人认识论的更广泛理解。

Investigating How Engineers and Students Understand and Use Their Own KnowledgeThe US currently faces a number of challenges, from developing new sources of energy to managing increasing health costs - which require new approaches for their solutions. The pace of technological change is rapidly increasing at the same time, such that the tools available and the challenges now being faced are not the same ones that will be present in only a few years. Thus, it is imperative that the education of engineers includes teaching them to use existing knowledge in new ways to tackle unexpected problems. This study investigates how students and engineers understand their own knowledge, so we will be better able to address students' existing knowledge models and help them develop into more agile, efficient engineers of the future.The goal of this project is to understand how students' personal epistemologies (i.e. their assumptions about what it means to know something, and what counts as knowledge) develop through their experiences in engineering education and practice. As students learn, professors teach, and administrators work toward constant improvement, they are all operating from within their own personal epistemologies and making fundamental assumptions about how knowledge and certainty are generated, shared and re-formed. In particular, they all make assumptions about the epistemology of engineering and what characterizes an engineering way of knowing. Currently, epistemological assumptions about engineering practice are largely unspoken and unexamined. Current research suggests that many faculty members operate under different assumptions about knowledge, and that these differences limit their potential to develop or collaborate toward common goals. This project will use interviews and thematic analysis to bring to light the personal epistemologies of engineering students and faculty, and help orient them to the epistemological demands of engineering practice. It is essential that central stakeholders develop tools and resources to discuss their own and others' personal epistemologies to achieve the goals of engineering education, and to make sure that those goals remain oriented to achieving significant social good. The practical goals of this project can be expressed as four specific aims: (1) Characterize the personal epistemologies of engineering students and practicing engineers; (2) Critically analyze the implications of students' personal epistemologies in the contexts of engineering education and practice; (3) Iteratively develop, implement and assess materials and methods for epistemological learning in engineering content courses, and; (4) Develop broader understanding of personal epistemologies among engineering educators and engineering education researchers.