Little did we know that we would start a university-wide project in the middle of a pandemic when we submitted our proposal to the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) in January 2020. In August 2020, just before the start of the fall semester, with classes online for almost all faculty, [...]
It is often said that engineers learn theories at university and develop practical knowledge by experience. New knowledge emerging from research on engineering practice shows we could provide more effective education for our future engineers. We could make the transition to work much easier, improve productivity world-wide and accelerate our [...]
Figure 1: Comparison of the traditional versus flipped classroom In our roles as faculty developers in the Leonhard Center for the Enhancement of Engineering Education at Penn State, we often consult with faculty on their teaching practices. Classroom flip has been one instructional approach that is very appealing [...]
There was a time when a career in engineering could be developed for decades in a watertight compartment without anything related to art permeating it. That is what I experienced in the 1980s when I was a young female engineering student and felt that a great dichotomy loomed over me [...]
It’s no secret that teams are an integral part of undergraduate engineering courses. In my last two decades of teaching engineering and technical communication courses, I’ve been asked to help in many engineering courses where student groups were struggling. I’m going to be plainspoken: engineering students struggle (and hate) working [...]
Abstract: The digital divide was once understood as a generational divide created by the challenges of integration of digital technology into daily life. As computers are becoming the basis for many educational practices, it unfolds itself as a possible educational problem, as students without access to hardware and an internet [...]
Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) are bringing new ways to interact and manipulate information that were previously unseen. They are also easily re-configurable, meaning that once the infrastructure is available (the computer laboratory, the internet connection, the educational laptop, etc.) it is considerably cheaper to test new software and to [...]
The rapid adjustment required by long standing higher education institutions, grounded in well-established face to face learning practices to online learning in 2020, has created a demand for alternative and innovative assessment approaches. This article will outline an assessment framework that is highly effective and adaptable, suitable for online learning, [...]
Extended Reality (XR) has become an umbrella term covering all forms of immersive reality that combine the virtual and real worlds – Virtual Reality (VR), Augmented Reality (AR) and Mixed Reality (MR). XR offers a unique sense of presence where the real and the simulated combine [1]. It makes sense [...]