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The Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET) has adopted a revised set of criteria for accrediting engineering programs. Nevertheless, as in the past, civil engineering departments will be required to demonstrate proficiency in specific subject areas which are included in the ABET program criteria. This paper investigates, according to civil engineering students, the level at which their understanding of various subjects required by ABET and listed in the Program Criteria for Civil and Similarly Named Engineering Programs and the General Criteria (Professional Component) has been enhanced by being involved with projects associated with the steel bridge and concrete canoe competitions. The results are also compared with students who have practical civil engineering experience. In particular, the findings suggest that students who are directly involved with project work believe that four areas have been greatly enhanced. They include: structural engineering, project management/scheduling and estimating, constructability, and teamwork. Understanding of engineering codes and standards, health and safety issues, materials engineering, and ethical considerations are also perceived to be enhanced. Furthermore, the results complement documentation from the American Institute of Steel Construction including comments from students participating in the steel bridge competition. [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]

One of the pivotal goals in engineering education is to broaden participation ofdifferent minorities. An overlooked barrier yet to be explored is how hidden curriculum and its connected constructs may impede this goal. Hidden curriculum (HO refers to the unwritten, unofficial, and often unintended assumptions, lessons, values, beliefs, attitudes, and perspectives in engineering. This paper will present the development and assessment of a mixed-method vignette survey instrument to evaluate the responses of current engineering students and faculty when exposed to several examples of hidden curriculum. Results from 153 engineering students and faculty across the United States and Puerto Rico were used to assess the survey sub-subscales (HC awareness, emotions, self-efficacy, and self-advocacy). Findings revealed Cronbach alpha coefficients of 0.70 (HC awareness), 0.73 (emotions), 0.91 (self-efficacy), and 0.91 (self-advocacy). The overall instrument had a reliability of 0.74. Alongside HC awareness, we found that among different axes of inequity, gender, role, and institution type are important elements that shaped the responses of these engineering populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The complexity and dynamics of the automotive industry require highly trained graduates with competencies and skills in various scientific and industrial fields, as well as practical skills. Theory with can be applied to practice in several ways: increasing practical application of labs and workshops, practice activities, race car contests, participation in scientific groups, work on research and development projects, internships, etc. The present paper explores the attitudes and perceptions of students who participated in an international competition for prototype vehicles powered with compressed air. Based on an exploratory questionnaire, uni- and multivariate statistical methods were applied, and the results were used to create a model related to the students’ perception of the usefulness of participating compared to the additional engineering skills learned. The results show that students involved in race car competitions enjoy positive feedback and more (regardless of country of origin) and learn professional skills with high-quality and relevant technical, social, and behavioral competences, which are required in the automotive industry today. [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]

The focus of the paper is on implementation of a core undergraduate course offered to non-electrical engineering students. The course provides a foundation and an avenue for physical system modelling and applying a system approach to problem solving. It is a prerequisite course for the automatic control course offered in the seventh semester. The logical sequence of the course follows the flow of data from sensing element, transduction, signal conditioning and digital conversion. Several specially tailored experiments are designed to motivate students and inculcate professional attitudes. Based on students' questionnaires, they are more interested in laboratory work, and in using problem solving skills, than in theories and analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The digitalization of education is a continuously developing process, aimed at the use of information and communication technologies. However, engineering education utilizes several forms of learning, with laboratory experiments being one of them. The use of digital learning materials (DLM) in labs is still limited due to numerous existing factors. This study investigates students' acceptance of using DLM during laboratory exercises in three universities located in Turkey, Poland, and Bulgaria. A questionnaire was prepared, and a survey was conducted among 625 learners. They were divided into eight categories, based on their engineering area and country. The survey results demonstrate that there is a strong correlation between the students' opinion on DLM and the use of DLM by their lab instructors, which means that their acceptance could be increased if more DLM are integrated in lab courses. The analysis of the questionnaire results also showed that there is a significant difference in the students' opinion on DLM, depending on the engineering area. Students of Food, Chemistry, and Electrical engineering rated the use of DLM quite high (above 4.0 out of 5), followed by the Civil engineering students with average results between 3.5 and 4.0. Respondents involved in Textile, Bio, and Machine engineering were the most skeptical (<3.5). Furthermore, their opinions covered a wide range from "Strongly disagree" to "Strongly agree." [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Engineering schools are struggling to maintain or increase the number of engineering students. Most attempted solutions focus on better marketing and publicity of the engineering field to K-12 students. How- ever, a large population of K-12 home-schooled students remains relatively untapped. This paper provides background information about the home- school population and their academic performance. The methods that universities and engineering schools can use to recruit home-schooled students are provided in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]