Advanced Engineering Students Research Articles

Factors Influencing Success in Advanced Engineering Mathematics Courses: A Case Study

Several studies have been conducted to understand the predictors of academic performance of various levels of high school and undergraduate students as quantified by the grade point average. This study focuses specifically on engineering students as they differ from other undergraduate students in their background and expectations. We focus on quantifying essential predictors of the performance of engineering students in an advanced mathematics course. We collected data from 72 participants recruited from engineering students enrolled in the advanced engineering mathematics (AEM) course in a research university. We chose this course to represent a standard engineering mathematics course covering several essential topics. We consider several factors in our analysis, such as cellphone usage and the academic background, e.g., the academic year, number of minors, and majors, performance in prerequisite courses. We perform several regression analyses to understand the effects of cellphone usage, course schedule, and academic background on performance in the AEM course and its prerequisites. In particular, we use the stepwise regression technique using forward selection and backward elimination procedures. We discovered a few interesting findings in this case study. Firstly, for the participants in this study, we find that the daily average “screen time” on their cellphones is not a statistically significant predictor of student performance. This finding contradicts some prior studies on this participant and may indicate adaption and integration of the technology by the new generation of students in recent years. We also found that the lecturing schedule was not an influential factor for their academic performance. These findings are especially relevant during the COVID-19 pandemic, as they suggest that advanced engineering students have adapted to the use of technology and are flexible concerning lecture schedules. Another unexpected finding is that this study brings new evidence that the number of minors taken by the participants is a negative predictor of their grade in the AEM course. This observation may indicate that course-work from non-major classes may adversely impact their performance in mathematical engineering courses.

Using schema training to facilitate students' understanding of challenging engineering concepts in heat transfer and thermodynamics

AbstractBackgroundChi and colleagues have argued that some of the most challenging engineering concepts exhibit properties of emergent systems. However, students often lack a mental framework, or schema, for understanding emergence. Slotta and Chi posited that helping students develop a schema for emergent systems, referred to as schema training, would increase the understanding of challenging concepts exhibiting emergent properties.PurposeWe tested the effectiveness of schema training and explored the nature of challenging concepts from thermodynamics and heat transfer. We investigated if schema training could (a) repair misconceptions in advanced engineering students and (b) prevent them in beginning engineering students.MethodWe adapted Slotta and Chi's schema training modules and tested their impact in two studies that employed an experimental design. Items from the Thermal and Transport Concept Inventory and expert‐developed multiple‐choice questions were used to evaluate conceptual understanding of the participants. The language used by students in their open‐ended explanations of multiple‐choice questions was also coded.ResultsIn both studies, students in the experimental groups showed larger gains in their understanding of some concepts—specifically in dye diffusion and microfluidics in Study One, and in the final test for thermodynamics in Study Two. But in neither study did students exhibit any gain in conceptual questions about heat transfer.ConclusionOur studies suggest the importance of examining the nature of the phenomena underlying the concepts being taught because the language used in instruction has implications for how students understand them. Therefore, we suggest that instructors reflect on their own understanding of the concepts.

Transforming early concepts with Design Heuristics

Idea development in the early phases of the design process often involves the transformation of initial concepts into more feasible alternatives. However, this important component of design activity is often under-emphasized in design education, and tools to facilitate iteration of designs are limited. This study investigated Design Heuristics as a tool for the further development of initial concepts created by student designers. In a single session, advanced engineering students created initial concepts, and then used Design Heuristics to transform these concepts into alternative designs. The concept sets generated were analyzed, and eight types of transformations were identified, including the enhancement of aesthetics, features, functions, settings, materials, sizes, organizations, and usability. Design Heuristics supported students’ concept development by providing specific suggestions about ways to iterate on their initial concepts. As a result, students explored alternative concepts by producing multiple transformations of their designs, and were more likely to select these transformed concepts as their most creative, unique, and favourite designs.

A Comparison of Beginning and Advanced Engineering Students’ Description of Information Skills

Abstract
 
 Objective – The purpose of this research was to examine how beginning and advanced level engineering students report use of information when completing an engineering design process. This information is important for librarians seeking to develop information literacy curricula in the context of engineering design.
 
 Methods – Researchers conducted semi-structured interviews about information strategies used in engineering design with 21 engineering students (10 first and second year; 11 senior and graduate). Researchers transcribed interviews and developed an inductive coding scheme. Then, from the coding scheme, researchers extracted broader themes. 
 
 Results – Beginning level engineering students interviewed: (a) relied primarily on the parameters explicitly given in the problem statement; (b) primarily used general search strategies; (c) were documentation oriented; and (d) relied on external feedback to determine when they had found enough information. Advanced level engineering students interviewed: (a) relied on both their own knowledge and the information provided in the problem statement; (b) utilized both general and specific search strategies; (c) were application oriented; and (d) relied on self-reflection and problem requirements to determine when they had found enough information. 
 
 Conclusion – Beginning level students describe information gathering as externally motivated tasks to complete, rather than activities that are important to inform their design. Advanced level students describe more personal investment in their use of information through consideration of information based on their prior knowledge and questioning information. Future research should consider how to best support beginning level engineering students’ personal engagement with information.

Generic non-technical procedures in design problem solving: Is there any benefit to the clarification of task requirements?

The quasi-experimental field study with 174 advanced engineering students analysed the possibilities to assist the requirement analysis when solving design problems. Technical check lists are in common practice for assisting the requirement analysis. We wondered if a generic question answering system (GQAS) aiming at the ‘semantic relationships’ would offer an additional benefit to the exhaustive identification of the requirements of a design task when a technical check list were offered at the same time. Therefore, the students were asked to develop a list of requirements for the design of a machine collecting windfall. Whereas one group was offered the technical check list together with the generic question answering system, the other group was only offered the technical check list in assisting their task. The entire number of identified applicable requirements is significantly higher for the group with the additional GQAS. The additional benefit of answering generic interrogative questions holds for the majority of the individual categories of technical requirements. The benefit is explained with the proven stimulation of meta-cognitive processes by means of systems of interrogative questions. Practically, the consideration of generic procedures of problem solving in engineering design education may be recommended.

Dissipative Systems Analysis and Control: Theory and Applications (2nd Edition)-[Book review; B. Brogliato, R. Lozano, B. Maschke

This book presents a fully revised and expanded treatment of dissipative systems theory. It examines linear and nonlinear systems with examples of both in each chapter; some infinite-dimensional examples are also included. Throughout emphasis is placed on the use of the dissipative properties of a system for the design of stable feedback control laws. This second edition is substantially reorganized both to accommodate new material and to enhance its pedagogical properties. The main value of the book is that it us an up-to-date reference of dissipative systems in the framework of many system descriptions. It is a good roadmap to the many contributions on the subject. It is a good reference for dissipative systems for advanced engineering students and researchers in control, however quantity was obtained at the cost of pedagogical quality; an opportunity was missed to create an interesting textbook for these categories. The text is recommended for its vast amount of timely information and indications to the literature. However, the latter information could have been better filtered and structured to provide a unified basic deep knowledge of the field of dissipative systems, which can be mentally reconstructed by the student reader.

Occupant Perception of the Work Environment

Twelve features of the indoor environment representing the thermal, acoustical, lighting and air quality constituents were rated according to their percentage contribution to the quality of the indoor space by 111 advanced engineering students and 89 clerical workers. The resulting mean percentages were: temperature 15.8; brightness of the lighting, 11.0; tobacco smoke, 9.8; loudness of the sound, 8.7; noisy distractions, 8.5; lighting glare, 7.9; odor, 7.5; air movement, 7.2; humidity, 7.1; dust, 6.7; shadows, 5.1; and pitch, 4.7. The results showed that the thermal environment was judged to be significantly more important (p < .01) than the other three constituents, that the loudness and pitch of the sound was significantly (p < .01) more important to the student sample than to the clerical sample, and that temperature was perceived as more critical (p < .05) to the clerical sample than to the student sample.