Transportation Engineering Education Research Articles

RETRACTED: Research on construction of innovative teaching system of transportation engineering and talent evaluation based on CDIO

The effective integration of CDIO education philosophy and the cultivation of innovative talents is an effective way to carry out the education of Transportation Engineering. With the changes in the transportation industry, the current transportation engineering education is difficult to meet the market's urgent demand for innovative engineering and technical personnel, mainly due to outdated teaching content and teaching methods, imperfect evaluation system, and imperfect teaching team construction. According to the above-mentioned problems, we should adjust to form a teaching mode suitable for innovative transportation talents. Based on the in-depth study of the existing deficiencies, this article uses the CDIO (conceive, design, implement, operate) to combine the cultivation of transportation engineering talents with the actual needs of the enterprise. By enriching educational resources, optimizing the educational evaluation system, and improving the practical teaching system, the quality and level of transportation engineering education will be effectively improved to achieve the goal of training innovative talents. The optimized teaching mode has a certain reference function for the discipline construction and innovative talent cultivation of engineering majors in colleges and universities.

Designing web‐games for transportation engineering education

AbstractThis paper presents the gamification of transportation engineering education. We identified what the authors deemed to be the key hard concepts in the taught course and designed five web‐games targeting five areas within transportation engineering. The developed games were tested with undergraduate students. The results show that the games can enhance the students’ understanding of the hard concepts.

Applying Problem-Oriented and Project-Based Learning in a Transportation Engineering Course

AbstractA growing consensus in the literature on how to improve the quality of learning suggests that adaptions to problem-based learning (PBL) methods could firstly improve learning experiences, problem solving, skill acquisition and a reasonable level of skill transfer from a student perspective, and secondly develop better professional competence and preparation in these needed highway capacity analysis skills. This paper describes the educational basis of problem-oriented and project-based learning (POPBL) approaches that have been developed as an integral part of a four-year undergraduate engineering degree program at the University of Delaware and incorporated into the transportation curriculum, using real world cases to teach students how to think like expert practitioners. A seven-phase POPBL conceptual framework and the experiences of employing POPBL are presented to demonstrate how it operates in transportation engineering education.

Transportation Engineering Instructional Practices

Instructional practices in transportation engineering education are evolving, and only some of these changes have been documented in the literature. This paper provides a systematic review of journal articles and refereed conference papers that address innovations in transportation engineering education; the focus is on novel instructional practices and their influence on student learning. The literature review finds 46 articles for analysis, with an increasing frequency of those publications over time. Instructional practices described in these papers include simulation, visualization, problem-based learning, and other active-learning techniques. Most of these articles were written by individual researchers or a team of researchers at a single institution, and few of the articles cite one another; this finding suggests a need for more effective dissemination. Techniques for measuring student learning include in-person interviews, a variety of survey types (typically multiple choice or open-ended), concept maps, and direct assessment of student work. These techniques are implemented mostly as postassessments, but in some work, a pre- and postcourse experimental design is employed. It is clear that more rigorous evaluation of student learning, resulting from changes in teaching practices, should be considered. This analytical review of the literature provides a resource for transportation engineering educators to identify pedagogical practices that are relevant to their courses and suggestions for how to measure the effect of these techniques on student learning.

Transportation Engineering Education for Undergraduate Students: Competencies, Skills, Teaching-Learning, and Evaluation

AbstractIn general terms, engineering education at the undergraduate level should be based on at least three aspects: the definition of learning outcomes aligned not only with theoretical contents but also with competencies and skills; the specification of teaching-learning methods; and the evaluation of the learning outcomes. The purpose of this study was to analyze an approach that combines traditional lectures and active learning into one strategy to help in the development of competencies and skills demanded by the transportation engineering profession. The authors examined if the acquisition of the skills could be assessed through conventional evaluation techniques and concept maps. An experiment was conducted for the specific case of the course Planning and Analysis of Transport Systems, in three phases: (1) planning the teaching-learning process; (2) evaluating the teaching-learning process; and (3) evaluating the teaching-learning product. The results show that the use of a problem-identification ...

Influence of Collaborative Curriculum Design on Educational Beliefs, Communities of Practitioners, and Classroom Practice in Transportation Engineering Education

AbstractThe development and widespread implementation of best practices in transportation engineering classrooms is important in attracting and retaining the next generation of transportation engineers. Engineering education professionals have uncovered many best practices in the field; however, the process of effectively disseminating and ultimately achieving the widespread adoption of these best practices by others is not yet well understood. Sixty participants, including faculty members, Ph.D. students, and public-sector employees, attended a transportation engineering education workshop convened in Seattle to promote the collaborative development and adoption of active learning and conceptual exercises in the introduction to transportation engineering class. Participant assessments were conducted in the form of presurvey, postsurvey, and follow-up survey. Results showed immediately positive shifts in participant beliefs about the importance of active learning and conceptual exercises, with declines du...

Evaluating the Effectiveness of Dynamic Traffic Animations: Case Study in Transportation Engineering Education

Development of learning tools is critical for improving engineering education and teaching difficult engineering concepts. Representations are learning tools that can help students understand conceptual systems by providing insight to a concept, problem, or system through explicit cues. Researchers at the University of Idaho have developed structured activities involving animations that are representations of traffic simulations designed as part of the Mobile Signal Timing Training (MOST) project for teaching traffic signal timing. In this study, the effectiveness of the MOST animations were evaluated through a pre-/postcomparative case study. Overall, the MOST animations were successful in improving student understanding of timing parameters involved in actuated control at signalized intersections. The MOST activities were more effective than comparison methods in facilitating student learning for concepts of minimum green time, maximum green time, and duration of the green indication. Students also showed an improved understanding of the relationship between cycle length and delay and passage time, but not more so than comparison students. Results indicate that animations are effective in improving student understanding of concepts involving dynamic processes or reactions.

Process for Improving Design of Transportation Curriculum Materials with Examples

Student-centered learning is presented as an alternative to the traditional lecture-based approach commonly used in transportation engineering education. Student-centered learning includes an array of pedagogical approaches, such as active learning, cooperative learning, problem-based learning, guided discovery, applied critical thinking, and open-ended labs, each promoting deeper levels of understanding. Two methods of curriculum development that support student-centered learning are presented. Three examples of transportation curricula based on these two methods are offered: the Highway Capacity Manual Applications Guide, mobile signal timing training, and the Transportation Education Development Pilot Project Arterial Traffic Signal Operations course. Each example is evaluated according to criteria that support the curriculum development methods. Conclusions from this evaluation and suggested future research directions are presented.

Simulating Transportation for Realistic Engineering Education and Training

The practice of transportation engineering and planning has evolved substantially over the past several decades. A new paradigm for transportation engineering education is required to engage students better. Simulation tools have been used by transportation professionals to evaluate and analyze the potential impact of design or control strategy changes. Simulation, which can effectively convey complex transportation concepts, is particularly valuable in transportation education. The use of simulation in transportation education gives students the opportunity to apply different control strategies in a risk-free environment and teaches them transportation engineering methodologies. Despite its advantages, simulation has not been widely adopted in transportation engineering education. Its use in undergraduate transportation courses is sporadic; the reported efforts have been primarily in upper-level technical elective courses. A suite of web-based simulation modules has been developed and incorporated into undergraduate transportation courses at the University of Minnesota. The Simulating Transportation for Realistic Engineering Education and Training (STREET) research project was recently awarded a grant by the National Science Foundation to develop web-based simulation modules, to improve instruction in transportation engineering courses, and to evaluate their effectiveness. The ultimate goal of the STREET project is to become the epicenter for the development of simulation-based teaching materials that provide undergraduates with an interactive learning environment. Given the hands-on aspect of simulation, the hope is that its use will improve student understanding of critical concepts in transportation engineering, and will also enhance student interest in transportation engineering and thereby increase their presence in the field. The intention is to disseminate the results and teaching materials to other colleges so they can integrate these online modules into their curricula.

Traffic Signal Operations Education Through Hands-On Experience: Lessons Learned from a Workshop Prototype

The development, implementation, and assessment of the traffic signal summer workshop (TSSW) are explored. An innovative educational prototype that has been conducted at the University of Idaho during the past two summers, TSSW addresses several critical issues, including the need to educate and train university engineering students in different ways, and the lack of adequately trained engineers and technicians prepared to design and manage today’s traffic signal infrastructure. Those issues are discussed along with the pedagogical basis for hands-on experiences in engineering education. Also discussed is how the university has responded, with the TSSW prototype, to the need to deliver transportation engineering education in a new way.

Development of Transportation Engineering Research, Education, and Practice in a Changing Civil Engineering World

Transportation has been one of the essential areas within civil engineering since its early days. In commemoration of the 150th anniversary of ASCE, this paper presents a review of developments in research, education, and practice in transportation engineer- ing. The review is based primarily on the issues of the Journal of Transportation Engineeringover the past several decades. Main topics include transportation engineering practice, airport and highway pavements and materials, design and safety, planning and operations, pipelines, technology, and education. Historical appraisals and the current state-of-the-art for these topics are discussed. In conclusion, future directions in transportation engineering as a result of advances in technology and the attendant changing need of the transportation engineering profession in the 21st century are addressed.