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The present research refers to the assigning of a hands-on group project to freshman engineering students, evaluating their performance, and deriving conclusions on student benefits and educational advances. The research procedure included action plans for the instructor and the students, instructions to the students on performing the work, organizational instructions to the teams and reporting guidelines, and evaluation of the success of the project. The main outcomes refer to the team co-operation, the performance of tasks, the quality of results and the reporting effectiveness. The ‘paper beam’ project benefited the student’s learning and proved the need of complementary learning styles in teams, of the appreciation of quality performance and results, as well as of the accuracy in project details. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a design-based research project undertaken to test and implement an interest-based engineering challenges framework for pre-college students. This work is motivated by the need for innovative engineering education practices in pre-college settings, and making engineering more inclusive for people from diverse backgrounds. The design-based research methodology can be challenging to implement as it comprises of multiple, cyclical research activities that provide challenges in documenting and communicating the larger study's progress. This paper presents findings from this continuously evolving study, and also the design and implementation of this design-based research at roughly the halfway point for a four-year study. Each of the consequent versions scaffold to answer the broader research questions of the study pertaining to: engineering appealing to students' personal interests, empowering underrepresented groups to find meaningful connections to engineering, leading more authentic engagement in engineering and design practices, and improving students' attitudes and perception of engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the twenty-first century, meeting our technological challenges demands educational excellence, a skilled populace that is ready for the critical challenges society faces. There is widespread consensus, however, that education systems are failing to adequately prepare all students with the essential twenty-first century knowledge and skills necessary to succeed in life, career, and citizenship. The purpose of this paper is to understand how twenty-first century knowledge and skills can be appropriately embedded in engineering education finalised to innovative product development by using additive manufacturing (AM). The study designs a learning model by which to achieve effective AM education to address the requirements of twenty-first century and to offer students the occasion to experiment with STEM (Science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) concepts. The study is conducted using the quality function deployment (QFD) methodology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In higher education, engineering students have to be prepared for their future jobs, with knowledge but also with several soft skills, among them creativity. In this paper, we present a study carried on with 128 engineering undergraduate students on their understanding of mathematical creativity. The students were in the first year of different engineering first degrees in a north-eastern Portuguese university and we analysed the content of their texts for the question 'What do you understand by mathematical creativity?'. Data collection was done in the first semester of the academic years 2014/2015 and 2016/2017 in a Linear Algebra course. The results showed that 'problem solving' category had the majority of the references in 2014/2015, but not in the academic year 2016/2017 were 'involving mathematics' category had the majority. This exploratory study pointed out for 'problem solving' and 'involving mathematics' categories and gave us hints for teaching mathematics courses in engineering degrees. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims at presenting the experience of the Power Conversion project in teaching students to design a proof-of-principle contactless energy transfer system for the charging of electrical vehicles. The Power Conversion is a second-year electrical engineering (EE) project in which students are to gather and apply EE knowledge to design and test a system. This system is to work with power level and operates independent from an electricity grid. The instructional method used in this project is design-based learning (DBL). As an educational approach, DBL is to support students to gather and apply knowledge inopen-endedassignments. The set-up of the project has gone through different modifications and iterations in three consecutive years regarding the organisation and supervision of the students. We have analysed the students’ design products in the past three academic years in order to evaluate whether the project set-up and supervision have influenced students’ designs. Results indicate that theopen-endedcharacter of the project has a positive influence on the designs especially regarding the criteria on efficiency, Maximum Power Point Tracking algorithm and power tracking. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This paper presents a theoretical basis for cultivating engineering education as a complex system that will prepare students to think critically and make decisions with regard to poorly understood, ill-structured issues. Integral to this theoretical basis is a solution space construct developed and presented as a benchmark for evaluating problem-solving orientations that emerge within students’ thinking as they progress through an engineering curriculum. It is proposed that the traditional engineering education model, while analytically rigorous, is characterised by properties that, although necessary, are insufficient for preparing students to address complex issues of the twenty-first century. A Synthesis and Design Studio model for engineering education is proposed, which maintains the necessary rigor of analysis within a uniquely complex yet sufficiently structured learning environment. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In the interest of understanding choices related to achievement, persistence, and performance that inform pursuit of careers in science, technology, engineering, and math, the current research pursued a novel approach to asking young children about their beliefs related to engineering. The Engineering-Related Activities and Skills (ERAS) items were developed to use instead of the term 'engineering' to measure children's achievement-related ability beliefs (competence) and subjective task values (importance, interest). A range of methods across three studies were implemented in the development and assessment of evidence related to the internal structure of the ERAS items across the domains of ability beliefs and subjective task values (N = 949 students). Results suggest initial evidence for the ERAS items being valid in measuring children's perceptions of engineering-related competence, importance, and interest. Theoretical and practical implications related to the factors that influence the academic and career choices in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields, as well as future directions are outlined. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The expectations students bring to Higher Education (HE) are explored, as well as the way they handle the clash betweenwhat they expect and what they actually find when attending Engineering programs. This study intends to understand if dissimilarengineering student profiles can be identified when considering the centrality of the student's role in his or her life, and the academicsuccess. The focus was put on the experiences of first-year students on an Engineering HE institution to uncover four differentways/rationales to build their own identity as a HE student. If an overinvestment in the student role can predict a greater possibility forfurther studies and an underinvestment can predict lower resilience that can lead to failure or dropout, the ability to manage theirstudent role together with the other roles associated with youth seems to predict an academic success similar to those who devotedtheir lives exclusively to studying. In other words, the fact that the student role overshadows the youth role is not enough for success.The balance between different life roles appears much more as a predictor of academic comfort and, consequently, of success. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Separate approaches in engineering education, research and practice are not very useful when preparing students for working life; instead, integration of education, research and industrial practices is needed. A triangular approach (TA) as a method to accomplish this integration and as a method to provide students with integrated expertise is proposed. The results from the application of TA, both at the course and programme level, indicate that the approach is suitable for developing engineering education. The student pass rate for courses where TA has been used has been higher than for previous approaches, and the student feedback has been very positive. Although TA aims to take both theoretical and practical aspects of engineering as well as research and education into account, the approach concentrates mainly on activities and therefore leaves the goals of these activities as well as the values behind these goals uncovered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides a self-assessment by final-year engineering students at the University of Botswana regarding the propensity to get employment. Students rated which employability attributes are important, the level of attainment and the sources that have facilitated the development of the attributes. Results indicated that students identified the most important attributes as management of time; possessing a high level of technical skills, meeting deadlines and creating viable solutions for solving a problem. They also indicated that they have weaknesses in managing time, meeting deadlines and creating viable solutions (attributes critical to the engineering profession). Students reported that their strengths were in having a positive attitude, orderly physical presentation, adaptation to new environments and willingness to learn new ideas. Students further noted that they developed the attributes from the university academic system followed by their own private activities. The study concludes that students lacked some of the critical attributes of engineering. They therefore, need to be explicitly and holistically sensitised as to how the attributes relate to their profession, employment and career development. As part of the review of the engineering programmes, sensitisation could be included in the induction process at enrolment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We have previously reported in this journal that spatial ability influences academic performance in engineering. We have also reported that spatial ability is trainable, and can be increased through instruction focused on using perception and mental imagery in three-dimensional representation. In this article, we present the results of a longitudinal evaluative study of student difficulties with engineering graphics at our university, involving research over a 24-year period. Prior to our intervention, the first-year engineering graphics course at our university had a failure rate of 36% for all engineering students, and failure rates of 80% for African students studying at our university. In terms of outcomes, our study indicates that changed teaching practices have been associated with increased pass rates, which currently average 88% for all students. There is clear evidence that African students no longer experience major difficulties in passing the course. This can be attributed both to changes in teaching methodology, as well as broader contextual changes occurring in South Africa over the period reviewed. Despite evidence of increased pass rates, our data suggest that there is a continuing relationship between three-dimensional spatial perception and academic performance in engineering graphics, as well as with aggregated first-year engineering marks. For this reason, many students still require academic support. There is also evidence that female students experience difficulties with engineering graphics due to lack of previous technical experience, and use a variety of strategies to overcome their study problems. The most effective appear to be use of peers and friends, and in particular students who had previously taken the course, as mediators of the course content and materials. Those female students who have not taken technical drawing at school level, and female students who do not network with other engineering students, are those at greatest disadvantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the learning experiences of engineering students of both genders in a problem-based and project-organized learning environment (PBL) at a Danish university. This study relates an amalgam of theories on learning and gender to the context of engineering education. Based on data from a qualitative study of an electrical and electronics engineering study programme, this study found that studying engineering in a PBL environment involves not only the mastery of technological knowledge but also an engineering identity development process. However, the association of an engineering identity with masculinity and the culturally defined engineering competencies leads to different learning experiences for male and female students. The nature of hard-core engineering subjects, based on male interests, privileges men and acts as a barrier to women. The masculine culture in engineering communities of practice involves more effort in identity management for women students than their male peers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study examines the use of Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) by undergraduate engineering students studying a business and management course. Discussing both the relationship between management and engineering and CAL applied to engineering education, this study is based on a survey of 82 undergraduates and adopts a quantitative research methodology. The results suggest that engineering students generally displayed positive attitudes towards CAL and that increased use of CAL improved course performance where it matched exactly the course assessment format. On the basis of this survey, the authors go on to consider the use of CAL in teaching engineering students business and management subjects at university. Cet article étude comment les étudiants de l'ingénierie utilisent l'enseignement assisté par ordinateur dans les études de gestion. L'article est fondé sur un sondage parmi quatre-vingt deux étudiants et une méthodologie de recherche quantitative. Il traite aussi le rapport entre l'ingénierie et la gestion et le rôle de l'enseignement assisté par ordinateur dans le cadre des études techniques. Les résultats semblent indiquer, qu'en général, les étudiants de l'ingénierie considèrent que l'enseignement assisté par ordinateur a un valeur educatif. De plus, l'enseignement assisté par ordinateur semble promouvoir une amélioration en matière de résultats, pourvu que les formats du logiciel et les contrôles soient les mêmes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]