Jan DeWaters

Establishing Measurement Criteria for an Energy Literacy Questionnaire

Energy literacy is a broad term encompassing content knowledge as well as a citizenship understanding of energy that includes affective and behavioral aspects. This article presents explicit criteria that will serve as a foundation for developing measurable objectives for energy literacy in three dimensions: cognitive (knowledge, cognitive skills), affective (attitude, values, personal responsibility); and behavioral. The outcome of this research is a framework from which a quantitative survey of energy literacy for secondary students in New York State, United States, can be created. Efforts supported by this research may help assess the broader impacts of educational programs in terms of their effectiveness for improving students’ energy literacy.

Energy literacy among middle and high school youth

An energy literacy survey for middle and high school students has been developed according to established psychometric principles and methodologies. The survey measures energy-related knowledge, attitudes and behaviors and is correlated to established benchmarks that define energy literacy as determined by a panel of energy- and energy-education specialists. Results from a pilot of the survey among 955 New York State students indicate low levels of energy-related knowledge, with fewer than 1% of the students scoring above 80%. Attitude and behavior scores are slightly better, suggesting that while students may recognize the existence of an energy problem, they generally lack the knowledge and capabilities to effectively contribute toward a solution. Results support the need for development and implementation of energy education programs as part of the regular school curriculum.

Designing an Energy Literacy Questionnaire for Middle and High School Youth

A measurement scale has been developed to assess secondary students’ energy literacy—a citizenship understanding of energy that includes cognitive as well as affective and behavioral items. Instrument development procedures followed psychometric principles from educational and social psychology research. Initial exploration of the measure yielded promising results: internal consistencies for the cognitive, affective, and behavioral subscales, measured by Cronbachs α, ranged from 0.75 to 0.83; average discrimination indices ranged from 0.27 to 0.46. The instruments validity was supported with contrasted-groups and developmental-age progression comparisons, as well as factor analyses. The energy literacy questionnaire provides an opportunity to measure baseline levels of energy literacy and to assess broader impacts of educational interventions.

Teaching Life-Cycle Perspectives: Sustainable Transportation Fuels Unit for High-School and Undergraduate Engineering Students

Classroom units were developed for high-school environmental science and college industrial ecology classes to introduce life- cycle perspectives and systems analysis of transportation fuel/vehicle systems. The units at both levels emphasize the need to consider energy and environmental issues related to the nations transportation sector that extend well beyond the gasoline pump and vehicle emissions. The units include several lessons to introduce environmental issues, understand the fuel and vehicle technologies (high-school level only), and conceptually and quantitatively evaluate differences among the expected future fuels through a life-cycle assessment. The quantitative assess- ment of the high-school students shows that the units helped students to significantly raise their energy knowledge and change their attitudes. Anecdotal information from the students indicates that the increased awareness about the seriousness of energy issues has caused them to be more conservative and conscientious about their energy consumption behaviors. The evaluation of the class in the 2009-2010 academic year (AY09) was excellent, suggesting that the addition of the life-cycle assessment activities described in this paper were well received by the students. DOI: 10.1061/(ASCE)EI.1943-5541.0000059.

A time series data transformation engine for non-programmer end users

With high networking connectivity and low-cost, high-grade sensors, production environments continue to collect abundant amounts of process data. While data acquisition and archiving systems are exceptional at collecting and storing time series data from disparate sources, the raw data from these systems are rarely presented in a format that is directly meaningful for end users. Decision makers often require to combine, interpolate, and transform the otherwise uninformative raw data in order to bring context and meaning to them. To this end, this paper presents the design and integration of an automated data calculation engine with an existing web-based data acquisition and visualization system called CLICS. At the core of the engine is an expression language for the specification of transformation/calculation formulae over time series data. With the calculation engine, a user can interactively specify a formula to transform multiple existing time series to create a new one that is significantly easier to understand and manipulate, or calculate a single value using a formula. To illustrate the communicative power of the engine, specific case examples are presented relating to three interconnected facilities (a greenhouse, a food waste digester, and an energy cabin) that are designed for conducting research and educational activities in energy efficiency and environmental sustainability on a university campus.

Enhancing the experience of first-year engineering students with an entry-level STS course: Science-technology-society

Engineering and Society, a course designed for first-year engineering (FYE) students and non-majors, was introduced in spring 2011 and most recently (F2014) became part of the required FYE core curricula. In addition to traditional elements of an FYE course such as the study of engineering disciplines and a team-based design project, students explore the various ways non-technical factors influence the development and integration of technology within our society, aligning with many of the learning outcomes specified by ABET General Criterion 3. Student outcomes were measured with a relatively simple pre-test/post-test study that uses a self-constructed on-line survey. Relative to the control group, students who enrolled in the course showed significantly greater gains in self-confidence, most notably with respect to engineering problem solving and design; sense of fit within the engineering profession; and understanding of the broad nature of engineering, including the importance of creativity, ethics, and societal influences to engineering design and decision making. Changes in academic self-confidence and satisfaction with the decision to study engineering were somewhat mixed, yet students in the course expressed a significant increase in their confidence of remaining in an engineering major throughout college, while students in the control group expressed a slight but not significant decline.