TY - GEN
T1 - Engineering virtual studio
T2 - 43rd IEEE Annual Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE 2013
AU - Thoroughman, Kurt A.
AU - Hruschka, Alessandra A.
AU - Ruzicka, Kathryn E.
AU - Widder, Patricia L.
PY - 2013
Y1 - 2013
N2 - Myopia on foundations early in undergraduate work is pandemic throughout STEM undergraduate training. This "sink or swim" foundational approach begets attrition and reduced motivation, engagement, and performance for those rugged students who stay in the major. Current approaches to alleviating this myopia, including integrative curricula and extracurricula, provide some context and community, but require great faculty and staff effort, and often requires onerous changes to the base curriculum, while leaving students stranded segueing into the sophomore year. Here we introduce and report on an initial pilot of an online alternative. Our one-credit, pass/fail course, Engineering Virtual Studio (EVS), provides explicit connections between foundational courses and real-world products and problems. The course also fosters both scholarly and pre-professional identity building as constant processes. We report on the course design, work in progress in our pilot year, and opportunity for improvement.
AB - Myopia on foundations early in undergraduate work is pandemic throughout STEM undergraduate training. This "sink or swim" foundational approach begets attrition and reduced motivation, engagement, and performance for those rugged students who stay in the major. Current approaches to alleviating this myopia, including integrative curricula and extracurricula, provide some context and community, but require great faculty and staff effort, and often requires onerous changes to the base curriculum, while leaving students stranded segueing into the sophomore year. Here we introduce and report on an initial pilot of an online alternative. Our one-credit, pass/fail course, Engineering Virtual Studio (EVS), provides explicit connections between foundational courses and real-world products and problems. The course also fosters both scholarly and pre-professional identity building as constant processes. We report on the course design, work in progress in our pilot year, and opportunity for improvement.
KW - Cyberlearning
KW - Identity
KW - Integrative thought
KW - Underclassmen
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84893333139&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1109/FIE.2013.6685104
DO - 10.1109/FIE.2013.6685104
M3 - Conference contribution
AN - SCOPUS:84893333139
SN - 9781467352611
T3 - Proceedings - Frontiers in Education Conference, FIE
SP - 1579
EP - 1581
BT - 2013 Frontiers in Education Conference
Y2 - 23 October 2013 through 26 October 2013
ER -