Helen L. Chen

Targeting undergraduate students for surveys: Lessons from the Academic Pathways Of People Learning Engineering Survey (APPLES)

The academic pathways of people learning engineering survey (APPLES) was deployed in April 2007 targeting cross-sectional populations from four American universities. The goal of APPLES is to validate earlier findings from the academic pathways study on factors that correlate with persistence in engineering. There is minimal literature detailing the practical process and methodology for engineering education researchers to undertake thorough, statistically-sound survey research, particularly as it relates to reaching specific student groups within the undergraduate engineering population. We outline the APPLES development methodology, and specifically the lessons learned in deploying a multi-site, medium-scale survey. This paper details our process for constructing the sampling plan and the resulting design for the APPLE survey, and addresses issues relating to working with campus liaisons, subject recruitment and deployment. Finally, we share preliminary response rates and feedback from respondents to inform a model for conducting survey design and research for engineering education researchers.

Cambridge Handbook of Engineering Education Research: Retention and Persistence of Women and Minorities Along the Engineering Pathway in the United States

Countries around the world rely on the contributions of engineers to support national interests and maintain economic competitiveness. In the United States, government and industry leaders have long regarded engineers and other members of the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) workforce as vital to the nation’s economy and security. It is hardly surprising, then, that issues surrounding student retention and persistence in engineering degree programs and the engineering workforce are of special interest to engineering educators. Since the 1970s, federal policy and funding have specifically focused on attracting and retaining women and minorities in science and engineering fields. Yet progress has been halting. In one comprehensive study, the United States ranked 30th of 35 countries in the proportion of female Ph.D.s in engineering, manufacturing, and construction, and 24th of 30 with respect to growth in the proportion of female Ph.D.s in these sectors (European Commission, 2009, p. 51).1 In this chapter, we examine the influence of U.S. federal policy on engineering education over the past forty years, with special attention to the impact of efforts to increase the numbers of women and minorities in the STEM workforce.

Scaling up: Taking the Academic Pathways of People Learning Engineering Survey (APPLES) national

The Academic Pathways of People Learning Engineering Survey (APPLES) was deployed for a second time in Spring 2008 to undergraduate engineering students at 21 American universities. The goal of APPLES was to corroborate and extend findings from the academic pathways study and the first deployment of APPLES (Spring 2007) on factors that correlate with persistence in engineering on a national scale. This set of deployments, which surveyed over 4,500 students, was among the largest and broadest cross-sectional surveys focusing on undergraduate engineering ever undertaken. Because there was no readily-available list of undergraduate students attending American institutions studying and intending to study engineering, we sampled by institution using institutional characteristics such as Carnegie 2000 classification. In seeking participation by a broad range of institutions, we recognized the need to vary the target student strata for recruitment by institution. In this process paper, we present an overview of our institutional sampling, discuss our student sampling and recruitment, and report response results. We extend our lessons learned from deploying the online survey at four institutions to 21 institutions, including coordination with local campus coordinators, IRB requirements, subject recruitment and deployment to build on the model for conducting survey design and research for engineering education researchers.

Outside the classroom: Gender differences in extracurricular activities of engineering students

Data from the Academic Pathways Study, a component of the NSF-funded Center for the Advancement of Engineering Education, were used to investigate engineering student involvement in extracurricular activities. The study design used a variety of methods: the results presented here are from longitudinal and cross-sectional surveys of engineering students as well as interviews with graduating seniors. Quantitative data from both surveys suggest that women place higher importance on extracurricular activities than their male counterparts, as well as reporting higher participation in both engineering-related and non-engineering-related extracurricular activities. In addition, the importance of non-engineering extracurricular activities and the level of involvement of engineering-related extracurricular activities increases over four years of engineering education for women. For men, an increase with time was only observed for involvement in engineering-related activities. Results from the interviews corroborate the quantitative findings as well as suggesting some intriguing differences between genders: for example, that women may be more likely to take on leadership roles and men more likely to be involved in activities which involve design or ‘handson’ work.

Creativity and cognition in engineering design: theoretical and pedagogical issues

This workshop will bring together researchers from the engineering design, engineering learning, and creativity communities to explore emerging theoretical and pedagogical issues related to creativity and cognition in engineering design. The need to produce a creative engineering workforce for the 21st century is well recognized. This workshop will help bridge the study of creativity (what is creativity in an engineering context) and cognition (how do engineering students become or act creatively). This workshop will lead to a framework for future research and strategies to prepare creative engineers.

Measuring Design Thinking Practice in Context

Design thinking is often misconceived as a competency that a person or organization either has or does not have. This is problematic because that perspective can lead to an incorrect assumption that design thinking is uniformly applied at the same level by anyone who knows it. This chapter describes design thinking as a practice that can range greatly depending on context. It outlines a series of measures developed to highlight both different aspects of design thinking and how those aspects can vary. These measures provide a more detailed assessment of what is necessary to successfully apply design thinking.

Special session - academic pathways study: Special interactive session on findings and implications for engineering education and practice

The Academic Pathways Study (APS) is a mixed- methods longitudinal study of engineering students at four institutions. The goals of this special interactive session are to begin the processes of (1) knitting APS knowledge into the larger body of engineering education scholarship, and (2) develop ways of thinking about these findings that inform engineering education program planning and classroom practice.