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This research paper focuses on the assessment of a makerspace at the University of Pittsburgh through the use of a student survey designed to answer whether the space is achieving its goals and how it is impacting users. As the rate of technological and societal change continues to increase, further emphasis is being placed on training skilled engineers, and calls for changes in engineering education to better prepare engineers for the future have been made. One approach institutions have taken towards achieving this is through the use of makerspaces. Anecdotal and indirect evidence support the use of these facilities to improve engineering skills in students. The makerspace of interest was built two years ago employing many of the best practices used at other institutions, and is also an integral part of a larger program at the university. To date, minimal data has been collected concerning the efficacy of the makerspace. To assess the makerspace, an anonymous survey comprised of Likert scale items, open-ended questions, and other quantitative questions was distributed electronically to both undergraduate and graduate engineering students. It asked students to rate statements about the makerspace related to its mission, and to rate statements about how using the space has improved different aspects of themselves. The results of the survey showed that the makerspace appears to be achieving its goals and is functioning as part of the university's efforts to increase student innovation and entrepreneurship. It showed that students feel using the makerspace has had positive effects on them, especially their creative thinking and ability to work on a team. It also revealed what aspects of the facility could potentially be improved. This evaluation contributes to the increasing body of knowledge on makerspace practices and potential impact on students. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies have shown that engineering students are typically not exposed to what they will encounter as practicing professionals: problems that are hard to define, have multiple stakeholders, and involve non-engineering constraints. There is therefore a need to expose engineering students to real, complex problems. Various publications in engineering education, including ABET outcomes, have also emphasized the importance of preparing students to work in multidisciplinary teams and to be knowledgeable of current issues. In 2013, the University of Pittsburgh implemented a course (ENGR 1060/2060) on social entrepreneurship that targets these concerns. The course, titled "Social Entrepreneurship: Engineering for Humanity", discusses social entrepreneurship through the lens of sustainability and "wicked", or complex, problems. It is taught as part of Engineers for a Sustainable World's (ESW) Wicked Problems in Sustainability Initiative, in which ESW provides the participating schools with a different wicked problem every year. The course is open to all majors, and to both undergraduate and graduate students. While the majority of the students thus far have been mostly undergraduates from different engineering majors, there have been undergraduate students from non-engineering majors as well as graduate students from both engineering and non-engineering majors, providing a multidisciplinary environment for students to discuss and learn about wicked problems. Although the semester-long project is a group project, students work on individual writing assignments that they submit throughout the semester. They are given prompts related to wicked problems, sustainability, and social entrepreneurship, and they then write 600-1000 words in response to these prompts. These writing assignments require that students find appropriate references to provide facts and support their statements, but they also require some personal reflection, and convey each individual's perspectives about the different topics. The purpose of this study is to explore how students' perceptions of and engagement with complex problems and stakeholders change as a result of participating in this course. Students' individual writing assignments from 2015 and 2016 were qualitatively analyzed to answer the following research questions: - In what ways do students describe complex problems, and how does this change from the beginning to the end of the semester? - In what ways do students characterize stakeholders, and how does this change from the beginning to the end of the semester? Data were analyzed using open coding. No predetermined themes were used as part of the data analysis; the resulting themes emerged from the data. Findings from this study can provide information regarding how students begin to think about complex problems, current issues, and stakeholders - problems such as those they will encounter as engineering professionals - and how these thoughts evolve throughout the semester. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this study is to learn about the experiences of postdoctoral scholars (postdocs) in science and engineering fields. It is guided by the theory of liminality. Forty-two postdocs employed at a Mid-Atlantic, research-intensive University, participated in individual interviews to describe their experiences as postdocs at the University. This paper provides answers to the following three research questions: (1) What are the benefits and challenges of science and engineering postdoc positions? (2) What liminal experiences characterize the postdoc position? and (3) What recommendations to improve the postdoc experience emerge from this study? [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discuses issues related to creating the Communities of Practice (CoPs) and change the teaching culture to be one of collaborative joint ownership within CoP. It also discusses characteristics of effective and ineffective CoPs, based on observation data and describes the different Research-Based Instructional Strategies (RBIS) that have been implemented.

This study examined how a professional development workshop affected faculty members' perspectives about incorporating academic integrity into their engineering courses. Embedded in the context of a new initiative at a large Mid-Atlantic University that aims to enhance engineering students' understanding of academic integrity and professional ethics, the workshop featured three aspects: 1) enhancing faculty members' self-efficacy in teaching academic integrity and professional ethics; 2) facilitating their development of instructional strategies for teaching integrity and ethics; and 3) supporting their classroom implementation of instructional plans. Seven faculty participants were interviewed after they implemented the new instructional plans in the semester following the workshop. Three major themes emerged from inductive analysis of interview transcripts. First, all participants reported that the workshop helped them become more aware of the importance of incorporating academic integrity into their teaching and were more reflective on how to effectively discuss this critical issue with their students. Second, after the workshop, participants made several changes in their courses and applied a variety of strategies to incorporate academic integrity into four aspects of their teaching: course syllabus, classroom discussion, assignments, and exams. Last, participants discussed several challenges when incorporating academic integrity into their courses, such as limited class time and unexpected extra workload. This work constituted our first steps in facilitating the discussion of academic integrity in engineering courses and supporting faculty members as they prepare students for ethical professional conducts. By exploring faculty members' perspectives about teaching academic integrity and the changes in their instructional design, this study provided important implications for future ethics education in engineering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is to expand the research base on creativity by assessing engineering students' creative self-concepts. A cross-sectional study of first-year and senior engineering students was conducted to investigate three constructs that measure creative selfconcept: creative self-efficacy, creative personal identity, and creative expectations. Gender differences in how creative self-concepts differ from first-year to senior year were also explored. The results show that female students have lower average scores on a creative self-efficacy scale at both the first and senior years. First-year female students have higher average creative identity scores than male students. However, senior male students have a stronger creative identity than senior female students. Senior males and females feel that instructors have lower expectations regarding creative behaviors as compared to first-year students. The lower expectation of senior students suggest that engineering instructors should consider ways to engage upper level students in creative behaviors. Future research includes a longitudinal study to examine how creative selfconcept changes in progression through the engineering curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses a study which explored the experiences and perceptions of international and domestic students in the first two years of undergraduate engineering programs in the U.S. It offers a look at the context of the study which involved first- and second-year students in the spring 2013 semester. It also compares the differences in global awareness and creativity of foreign and domestic students.