In this work, we examined the problem of preparing future faculty (graduate students) regarding t... more In this work, we examined the problem of preparing future faculty (graduate students) regarding their development in multiple roles, focusing on students in science and engineering disciplines. The purpose of the presented research was to address the questions, "Do graduate students believe that their current experiences align with the roles they will perform in their academic careers?" and "How do graduate students' perceptions of their professional roles change during the process of constructing portfolios?" We used the theoretical lens of role identity to guide this work; academic careers are typically categorized in terms of teaching, research, and service, which can be mapped as professional identity roles. We conducted a survey and focus groups with participants working through an ePortfolio development curriculum. Our findings suggest that there is a perception of misalignment between current and future roles, and that the construction of ePortfolios can be utilized to promote reflective practices leading to changed perceptions of those roles.
and co-Director of the VT Engineering Communication Center (VTECC). She is involved in several NS... more and co-Director of the VT Engineering Communication Center (VTECC). She is involved in several NSF-funded projects that explore issues of learning, practicing and teaching interdisciplinarity in university and industry settings. Her teaching emphasizes the roles of engineers as communicators and educators, the foundations and evolution of the engineering education discipline, and assessing communication in engineering. Her research includes communication and interdisciplinary collaboration, institutional structures that encourage transformational learning, and integrating engineering, the social sciences, and the humanities.
Transportation Research Board 88th Annual MeetingTransportation Research Board, 2009
Web games provide a platform for creative instructional activities that can capture the students&... more Web games provide a platform for creative instructional activities that can capture the students' attention towards the course. These games can be used to emulate the realistic situations which can be used as effective lab experiments that could give the students a hands-on ...
Often in diversity and inclusion research, the goal is to represent the perspectives of those who... more Often in diversity and inclusion research, the goal is to represent the perspectives of those who are ‘not at the table,’ but seldom do research methods provide the participants an actual seat ‘at the table.’ Informed by a participatory action research approach, we partnered with study participants, positioning them as our co-researchers. Together, we employed an unconference (also known as an Open Space Technology workshop) as a research method in order to elevate the voices of study participants, provide space for them to create a meaningful network, and maximize their collective expertise. Unconferences are gatherings that have no pre-set agenda; instead participants are convened around a central theme and the agenda is collaboratively designed by the attendees. This open-ended structure allows participants to initiate sessions on topics that matter to them; engage in inquiry, reflection, and learning; and develop plans, recommendations, and a record of the proceedings as the process unfolds. In the context of a research study, an unconference poses a high risk, high reward situation. The researcher/facilitator has very little control over the direction of the event and the types of data produced (i.e., high risk), whereas giving participants ownership and control generates insights that may be impossible to gather using other research methods (i.e., high reward). In June 2018, we held the ‘Unconference on Making Liberatory Spaces,’ bringing together representatives from diverse, inclusive, liberatory maker spaces from around the country to share their organizations’ stories and exchange best practices regarding inclusion of diverse populations in maker spaces. In this paper, we will share our planning process and the lessons we learned through planning and hosting our unconference — including event planning decisions, recruitment of participants, facilitation techniques, data collection methods, and IRB procedures — and discuss how an unconference could be employed by other researchers, especially those exploring emerging topics.
Abstract This study investigates how design artefacts shape interactions among student designers ... more Abstract This study investigates how design artefacts shape interactions among student designers and design reviewers to mediate design and design learning. By analysing data collected from two design courses in mechanical engineering and industrial design courses, this study draws on Winner’s concept of politics of the artefact and Gee’s discourse analysis to explore the ways in which design artefacts help structure social relationships and power dynamics between reviewers and students in design learning settings. We use this exploration to examine how student designers work with reviewers to negotiate meaning as they shift from student to collaborator. Our results indicate that functional and well-developed design artefacts allowed students to position themselves as experts of their designs; engage in collaborative, innovative discussion with design reviewers; and elicit constructive feedback from reviewers. In contrast, students who developed incomplete or inaccurate design artefacts experienced limited dialogue with reviewers and reinforced the power distance between them.
Engineers' identification with their profession is crucial for persistence among engineering stud... more Engineers' identification with their profession is crucial for persistence among engineering students and professionals; those individuals who do not maintain a sense of belonging, identify with engineering groups, or perceive themselves as engineers are more likely to leave the profession. However, little is known about the ways in which engineering students construct their personal and professional identities in tandem with disciplinary values, behaviors, and practices that are learned during the undergraduate education experience, particularly at the disciplinary level. To deepen the understanding of professional identity formation within this context, a quasilongitudinal grounded theory study was conducted to explore the experiences of 31 undergraduate students as they enrolled in and navigated through their civil engineering programs. Upon conducting an iterative process of data collection and analysis using a constant comparative approach, a grounded theory of professional identity negotiation emerged from the analyzed interview transcripts. This emergent theory titled Negotiating Equilibrium: Advancing from Outsider to Insider or the AOI Model, captures the identity negotiations performed by students as they iteratively define, adjust, and readjust definitions of self and profession to maintain a balance between their personal self and the learned disciplinary identity of the civil engineering profession. As participants gained this balance, they began to see themselves as professionals, advancing from an outsider (i.e., one not belonging to the civil engineering profession) to an insider (i.e., one belonging to the civil engineering profession). The emergent grounded theory model of this work positions professional identity formation as a dynamic, process-oriented phenomenon that is continuously evolving as an individual learns the values, behaviors, norms, and discourse of the civil engineering profession. Ultimately, this study contributes a more nuanced understanding of professional identity formation that can be used to directly inform classroom interventions that bolster the formation of professional civil engineering identities to enhance retention in the field.
This innovative practice paper introduces the use of personas as a design technique to guide the ... more This innovative practice paper introduces the use of personas as a design technique to guide the large-scale curriculum reform of an Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) program at [University X], a large Mid-Atlantic research-intensive institution. The team has created five personas to explore the potential breadth of the curriculum and expand the faculty perspective on who could be a successful ECE student in the department. The concept of personas originated in the field of human-computer interaction to represent subsets of potential users as abstracted sets of characteristics. Drawing from qualitative data including observations of team meetings and document analysis, this work describes the ethnographic inquiry designers used to develop profiles not solely based on their biases. Responses to personas during implementation show that they can be used to engage the boundaries of culture, bringing to light not only characteristics of students who are not typically present in the program, but also faculty members’ assumptions about characteristics needed for success.
This chapter uses activity theory as a lens to understand the implications of both virtual collab... more This chapter uses activity theory as a lens to understand the implications of both virtual collaboration and cross-cultural contact for communication in global virtual teams. Rather than adopting a set of heuristics or guidelines that may readily become dated as cultures and technologies shift in the flat world, we argue that both those who study and those who engage in global virtual teams should critically analyze the entire activity system. We then provide meta-cognitive approaches to both distributed work and cross-cultural contact that team managers and team members can use to establish flexible communication practices appropriate to the activity system at hand, and that researchers can use to account for the range of factors that impact team performance.
Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society ... Annual Meeting, Sep 1, 2011
This study presents results from a comparative case study of interdisciplinary product design tea... more This study presents results from a comparative case study of interdisciplinary product design teams from two consecutive years under non-balanced and balanced disciplinary conditions. The main difference between the two conditions was the hands-on exercise modules focusing on each discipline (e.g., electronic prototyping exercise) used for the balanced condition. The purpose of this paper was to examine cultural traits of different disciplines (Electrical & Computer Engineering, Industrial Design, and Marketing) using questionnaires and show the impact of disciplinary balance on the effectiveness of interdisciplinary product design teams through qualitative analysis of team meetings and products. The results indicated that the teams under the balanced disciplinary condition showed higher effectiveness. Implications and the future direction for the work are also described.
BACKGROUND The Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at Virginia Tech is in the... more BACKGROUND The Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at Virginia Tech is in the fourth year of a large-scale change project called "Revolutionizing Engineering Departments" (NSF RED) (Lord et al., 2018). Our project has three interrelated goals: (1) broaden the range of students entering the department, (2) expand the boundaries on what careers are possible, and (3) provide greater student choice in curricular decisions (Reeping, McNair, Martin, & Ozkan, 2019). We finished phase one of curriculum development last year, the resulting new courses are being taught, and we are collecting baseline data. We expected and experienced resistance, as with any change effort (Hoey IV & Nault, 2008). However, a specific theme of resistance from faculty cut across the project goals during curriculum development: a suspicion that the new program would lack rigor. To better understand how faculty perspectives on rigor might influence change efforts and to identify productive ways to move forward together, we used a systems modeling technique-Causal Loop Diagrams (CLD)-designed to reveal connections in themes across large projects. We adopted CLDs to better understand concerns about the loss of rigor based upon comments by faculty about students we hoped to attract into the department-that some did not fit "under the ECE tent" or were "not serious" about the program-and about the curriculum, which the faculty did not want to "water down" (Ozkan et al., 2019, p. 5). Rigor has been defined as "creating an environment in which each student is expected to learn at high levels, each student is supported so he or she can learn at high levels, and each student demonstrates learning at high levels" (Blackburn, 2017, p. 13). Yet, rigor, in this case, had been seemingly perverted from a paradigm about challenging
This full research paper uses narrative inquiry to examine the emergent 'Teaching Toolbox' of a f... more This full research paper uses narrative inquiry to examine the emergent 'Teaching Toolbox' of a faculty member in an electrical and computer engineering department amid the backdrop of increasing class sizes. Four years ago, this ECE department received an NSF RED grant (Revolutionizing Engineering Departments) to enact large-scale curricular and culture change in the department over five years. The work under the grant has uncovered faculty-driven pedagogies that had formerly been at the periphery of the values held by the department-but did not receive much attention prior to the award. We use narrative inquiry to investigate the experiences of one electrical and computer engineering professor through a single case study. Our case study comprises multiple reflexive interviews contextualized within the history of the department through institutional documents and department meeting notes. This work is focused on the emergent pedagogical innovations one professor has enacted to [at least] maintain, [at most] improve, class engagement and participation as class sizes have increased. These pedagogical innovations reveal the multiple ways in which a professor has adapted their teaching practice to the institutional and departmental changes brought on in the past decade.
is a second year doctoral student in the Counselor Education and Supervision Program at Virginia ... more is a second year doctoral student in the Counselor Education and Supervision Program at Virginia Tech. She earned her BA in English Literature and M.Ed. in Counselor Education from Lynchburg College. Her primary research interest includes examining the lived experiences of individuals who have been mandated to receive substance use disorder treatment. Currently, Courtney serves as a graduate research assistant in the Department of Engineering Education at Virginia Tech. In this role, she conducts qualitative research to expand and deepen existing literature related to the experiences of civil engineering students who identify as having a disability.
International Journal of Engineering Education, 2018
Research from the past 10 years suggests that students continue to have difficultly mastering sta... more Research from the past 10 years suggests that students continue to have difficultly mastering statics content commonlyrequired in engineeringcurricula. Even when students succeed in demonstrating procedural knowledge, they often still lacka deep understanding of core concepts. In this mixed methods study, we explore the potential of a writing-to-learnassignment to enhance students’ conceptual learning in statics. Results from a quantitative analysis of exam grades for 345students show little difference between experimental and control sections, but results from nine qualitative interviews withstudents highlight four different metacognitive activities they applied to the writing-to-learn assignment. The widevariation in students’ approaches to this intervention, coupled with the emerging metacognitive acts, can be used to guidethe development of more effective interventions.
Contribution: This paper analyzes reflective thinking within organizational structures in higher ... more Contribution: This paper analyzes reflective thinking within organizational structures in higher education and draws parallels between the challenges faced by educators developing interdisciplinary courses and their students working in illstructured projects. Background: Interdisciplinarity as a learning goal is prevalent across engineering education literature. However, without organizational support structures to guide faculty members in developing interdisciplinary courses, interdisciplinarity as a student learning outcome is difficult to sustain. There is a need to evolve existing organizational structures faculty navigate when creating interdisciplinary courses, so that competing organizational systems do not stifle interdisciplinarity. Moreover, educators' effort in developing interdisciplinary courses is mirrored in the uncertain processes in which instructors engage students. Research Questions: In settings of interdisciplinary curriculum design and implementation, how do interdisciplinary faculty collaborations parallel that of their student design teams? How do organizational structures affect interdisciplinary faculty teams designing courses that span disciplines? Methodology: The study used a qualitative case, bound by three required courses in a new interdisciplinary undergraduate minor. Data was collected via interviews, class observations, and student reflection assignments. Analysis was guided by the conceptual frameworks of King and Kitchener's reflective judgment model and strange and banning's conceptualization of campus learning environments. Findings: Both educators and students develop through the discomfort with uncertainty-a prevalent theme in complex problem-solving. Forms of summative assessment pose an added challenge for both groups as they negotiate organizational structures. Lastly, discipline-specific expectations and ways of valuing knowledge contribute to uncertainty through the interactions among groups. Darmstadtium Fingers Diodes Honey pot (computing) Molecular beam applications Data communication International Atomic Time Leg Springs Thermal factors. Materials preparation Solar cooling Manganese alloys Heart valves Quantum cascade lasers Assembly systems Chrome plating Elastography Induction motor drives Nondestructive testing. Adhesives Supercapacitors Decoding Electrooptic deflectors Relaxation methods Velocity measurement Radar antennas Optical devices Radar remote sensing. Ventilation Heat engines Geophysics Timefrequency analysis Neutrino sources Machine components. Anthropomorphism Remaining life assessment Phase measurement Geochemistry Thermal decomposition WebRTC Reservoirs Relaxation methods MODIS Acoustic materials Memory Induction motors Biological tissues Inductive transducers. Garnets Ballistic transport Multisensory integration Empirical mode decomposition Electronic government Ambient assisted living Circulators Cancer Iterative algorithms Muscles Quality management Statistical distributions Integumentary system. Heart rate variability Ultra-dense networks Statistical distributions Dielectric loss measurement Notch filters Adaptive equalizers Chrome plating Nondestructive testing Biomedical communication Insertion loss Fabrication Physical design. Cloud gaming Digital images Remanence Business process management Ocean temperature. Atom optics Wind tunnels Digital storage Image processing Dermatology Foot. Dermatology Hypertext systems Optical fiber couplers Crosscultural communication Pulse compression methods Millimeter wave technology Pressure vessels Defibrillation Teleprinting. Iris recognition Genetics Scheduling Assembly systems Dielectric materials Terbium Foot Benign tumors Smoothing methods. Mutual funds Video compression International trade Micromanipulators Kirchhoff's Law Protactinium Pose estimation Boron alloys. Redundancy Active appearance model Relaxation methods Generators Milling machines Client-server systems Mechanical systems Radiation dosage Plastic insulators Line enhancers Adaptive signal detection.
In this work, we examined the problem of preparing future faculty (graduate students) regarding t... more In this work, we examined the problem of preparing future faculty (graduate students) regarding their development in multiple roles, focusing on students in science and engineering disciplines. The purpose of the presented research was to address the questions, "Do graduate students believe that their current experiences align with the roles they will perform in their academic careers?" and "How do graduate students' perceptions of their professional roles change during the process of constructing portfolios?" We used the theoretical lens of role identity to guide this work; academic careers are typically categorized in terms of teaching, research, and service, which can be mapped as professional identity roles. We conducted a survey and focus groups with participants working through an ePortfolio development curriculum. Our findings suggest that there is a perception of misalignment between current and future roles, and that the construction of ePortfolios can be utilized to promote reflective practices leading to changed perceptions of those roles.
and co-Director of the VT Engineering Communication Center (VTECC). She is involved in several NS... more and co-Director of the VT Engineering Communication Center (VTECC). She is involved in several NSF-funded projects that explore issues of learning, practicing and teaching interdisciplinarity in university and industry settings. Her teaching emphasizes the roles of engineers as communicators and educators, the foundations and evolution of the engineering education discipline, and assessing communication in engineering. Her research includes communication and interdisciplinary collaboration, institutional structures that encourage transformational learning, and integrating engineering, the social sciences, and the humanities.
Transportation Research Board 88th Annual MeetingTransportation Research Board, 2009
Web games provide a platform for creative instructional activities that can capture the students&... more Web games provide a platform for creative instructional activities that can capture the students' attention towards the course. These games can be used to emulate the realistic situations which can be used as effective lab experiments that could give the students a hands-on ...
Often in diversity and inclusion research, the goal is to represent the perspectives of those who... more Often in diversity and inclusion research, the goal is to represent the perspectives of those who are ‘not at the table,’ but seldom do research methods provide the participants an actual seat ‘at the table.’ Informed by a participatory action research approach, we partnered with study participants, positioning them as our co-researchers. Together, we employed an unconference (also known as an Open Space Technology workshop) as a research method in order to elevate the voices of study participants, provide space for them to create a meaningful network, and maximize their collective expertise. Unconferences are gatherings that have no pre-set agenda; instead participants are convened around a central theme and the agenda is collaboratively designed by the attendees. This open-ended structure allows participants to initiate sessions on topics that matter to them; engage in inquiry, reflection, and learning; and develop plans, recommendations, and a record of the proceedings as the process unfolds. In the context of a research study, an unconference poses a high risk, high reward situation. The researcher/facilitator has very little control over the direction of the event and the types of data produced (i.e., high risk), whereas giving participants ownership and control generates insights that may be impossible to gather using other research methods (i.e., high reward). In June 2018, we held the ‘Unconference on Making Liberatory Spaces,’ bringing together representatives from diverse, inclusive, liberatory maker spaces from around the country to share their organizations’ stories and exchange best practices regarding inclusion of diverse populations in maker spaces. In this paper, we will share our planning process and the lessons we learned through planning and hosting our unconference — including event planning decisions, recruitment of participants, facilitation techniques, data collection methods, and IRB procedures — and discuss how an unconference could be employed by other researchers, especially those exploring emerging topics.
Abstract This study investigates how design artefacts shape interactions among student designers ... more Abstract This study investigates how design artefacts shape interactions among student designers and design reviewers to mediate design and design learning. By analysing data collected from two design courses in mechanical engineering and industrial design courses, this study draws on Winner’s concept of politics of the artefact and Gee’s discourse analysis to explore the ways in which design artefacts help structure social relationships and power dynamics between reviewers and students in design learning settings. We use this exploration to examine how student designers work with reviewers to negotiate meaning as they shift from student to collaborator. Our results indicate that functional and well-developed design artefacts allowed students to position themselves as experts of their designs; engage in collaborative, innovative discussion with design reviewers; and elicit constructive feedback from reviewers. In contrast, students who developed incomplete or inaccurate design artefacts experienced limited dialogue with reviewers and reinforced the power distance between them.
Engineers' identification with their profession is crucial for persistence among engineering stud... more Engineers' identification with their profession is crucial for persistence among engineering students and professionals; those individuals who do not maintain a sense of belonging, identify with engineering groups, or perceive themselves as engineers are more likely to leave the profession. However, little is known about the ways in which engineering students construct their personal and professional identities in tandem with disciplinary values, behaviors, and practices that are learned during the undergraduate education experience, particularly at the disciplinary level. To deepen the understanding of professional identity formation within this context, a quasilongitudinal grounded theory study was conducted to explore the experiences of 31 undergraduate students as they enrolled in and navigated through their civil engineering programs. Upon conducting an iterative process of data collection and analysis using a constant comparative approach, a grounded theory of professional identity negotiation emerged from the analyzed interview transcripts. This emergent theory titled Negotiating Equilibrium: Advancing from Outsider to Insider or the AOI Model, captures the identity negotiations performed by students as they iteratively define, adjust, and readjust definitions of self and profession to maintain a balance between their personal self and the learned disciplinary identity of the civil engineering profession. As participants gained this balance, they began to see themselves as professionals, advancing from an outsider (i.e., one not belonging to the civil engineering profession) to an insider (i.e., one belonging to the civil engineering profession). The emergent grounded theory model of this work positions professional identity formation as a dynamic, process-oriented phenomenon that is continuously evolving as an individual learns the values, behaviors, norms, and discourse of the civil engineering profession. Ultimately, this study contributes a more nuanced understanding of professional identity formation that can be used to directly inform classroom interventions that bolster the formation of professional civil engineering identities to enhance retention in the field.
This innovative practice paper introduces the use of personas as a design technique to guide the ... more This innovative practice paper introduces the use of personas as a design technique to guide the large-scale curriculum reform of an Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) program at [University X], a large Mid-Atlantic research-intensive institution. The team has created five personas to explore the potential breadth of the curriculum and expand the faculty perspective on who could be a successful ECE student in the department. The concept of personas originated in the field of human-computer interaction to represent subsets of potential users as abstracted sets of characteristics. Drawing from qualitative data including observations of team meetings and document analysis, this work describes the ethnographic inquiry designers used to develop profiles not solely based on their biases. Responses to personas during implementation show that they can be used to engage the boundaries of culture, bringing to light not only characteristics of students who are not typically present in the program, but also faculty members’ assumptions about characteristics needed for success.
This chapter uses activity theory as a lens to understand the implications of both virtual collab... more This chapter uses activity theory as a lens to understand the implications of both virtual collaboration and cross-cultural contact for communication in global virtual teams. Rather than adopting a set of heuristics or guidelines that may readily become dated as cultures and technologies shift in the flat world, we argue that both those who study and those who engage in global virtual teams should critically analyze the entire activity system. We then provide meta-cognitive approaches to both distributed work and cross-cultural contact that team managers and team members can use to establish flexible communication practices appropriate to the activity system at hand, and that researchers can use to account for the range of factors that impact team performance.
Proceedings of the Human Factors and Ergonomics Society ... Annual Meeting, Sep 1, 2011
This study presents results from a comparative case study of interdisciplinary product design tea... more This study presents results from a comparative case study of interdisciplinary product design teams from two consecutive years under non-balanced and balanced disciplinary conditions. The main difference between the two conditions was the hands-on exercise modules focusing on each discipline (e.g., electronic prototyping exercise) used for the balanced condition. The purpose of this paper was to examine cultural traits of different disciplines (Electrical & Computer Engineering, Industrial Design, and Marketing) using questionnaires and show the impact of disciplinary balance on the effectiveness of interdisciplinary product design teams through qualitative analysis of team meetings and products. The results indicated that the teams under the balanced disciplinary condition showed higher effectiveness. Implications and the future direction for the work are also described.
BACKGROUND The Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at Virginia Tech is in the... more BACKGROUND The Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at Virginia Tech is in the fourth year of a large-scale change project called "Revolutionizing Engineering Departments" (NSF RED) (Lord et al., 2018). Our project has three interrelated goals: (1) broaden the range of students entering the department, (2) expand the boundaries on what careers are possible, and (3) provide greater student choice in curricular decisions (Reeping, McNair, Martin, & Ozkan, 2019). We finished phase one of curriculum development last year, the resulting new courses are being taught, and we are collecting baseline data. We expected and experienced resistance, as with any change effort (Hoey IV & Nault, 2008). However, a specific theme of resistance from faculty cut across the project goals during curriculum development: a suspicion that the new program would lack rigor. To better understand how faculty perspectives on rigor might influence change efforts and to identify productive ways to move forward together, we used a systems modeling technique-Causal Loop Diagrams (CLD)-designed to reveal connections in themes across large projects. We adopted CLDs to better understand concerns about the loss of rigor based upon comments by faculty about students we hoped to attract into the department-that some did not fit "under the ECE tent" or were "not serious" about the program-and about the curriculum, which the faculty did not want to "water down" (Ozkan et al., 2019, p. 5). Rigor has been defined as "creating an environment in which each student is expected to learn at high levels, each student is supported so he or she can learn at high levels, and each student demonstrates learning at high levels" (Blackburn, 2017, p. 13). Yet, rigor, in this case, had been seemingly perverted from a paradigm about challenging
This full research paper uses narrative inquiry to examine the emergent 'Teaching Toolbox' of a f... more This full research paper uses narrative inquiry to examine the emergent 'Teaching Toolbox' of a faculty member in an electrical and computer engineering department amid the backdrop of increasing class sizes. Four years ago, this ECE department received an NSF RED grant (Revolutionizing Engineering Departments) to enact large-scale curricular and culture change in the department over five years. The work under the grant has uncovered faculty-driven pedagogies that had formerly been at the periphery of the values held by the department-but did not receive much attention prior to the award. We use narrative inquiry to investigate the experiences of one electrical and computer engineering professor through a single case study. Our case study comprises multiple reflexive interviews contextualized within the history of the department through institutional documents and department meeting notes. This work is focused on the emergent pedagogical innovations one professor has enacted to [at least] maintain, [at most] improve, class engagement and participation as class sizes have increased. These pedagogical innovations reveal the multiple ways in which a professor has adapted their teaching practice to the institutional and departmental changes brought on in the past decade.
is a second year doctoral student in the Counselor Education and Supervision Program at Virginia ... more is a second year doctoral student in the Counselor Education and Supervision Program at Virginia Tech. She earned her BA in English Literature and M.Ed. in Counselor Education from Lynchburg College. Her primary research interest includes examining the lived experiences of individuals who have been mandated to receive substance use disorder treatment. Currently, Courtney serves as a graduate research assistant in the Department of Engineering Education at Virginia Tech. In this role, she conducts qualitative research to expand and deepen existing literature related to the experiences of civil engineering students who identify as having a disability.
International Journal of Engineering Education, 2018
Research from the past 10 years suggests that students continue to have difficultly mastering sta... more Research from the past 10 years suggests that students continue to have difficultly mastering statics content commonlyrequired in engineeringcurricula. Even when students succeed in demonstrating procedural knowledge, they often still lacka deep understanding of core concepts. In this mixed methods study, we explore the potential of a writing-to-learnassignment to enhance students’ conceptual learning in statics. Results from a quantitative analysis of exam grades for 345students show little difference between experimental and control sections, but results from nine qualitative interviews withstudents highlight four different metacognitive activities they applied to the writing-to-learn assignment. The widevariation in students’ approaches to this intervention, coupled with the emerging metacognitive acts, can be used to guidethe development of more effective interventions.
Contribution: This paper analyzes reflective thinking within organizational structures in higher ... more Contribution: This paper analyzes reflective thinking within organizational structures in higher education and draws parallels between the challenges faced by educators developing interdisciplinary courses and their students working in illstructured projects. Background: Interdisciplinarity as a learning goal is prevalent across engineering education literature. However, without organizational support structures to guide faculty members in developing interdisciplinary courses, interdisciplinarity as a student learning outcome is difficult to sustain. There is a need to evolve existing organizational structures faculty navigate when creating interdisciplinary courses, so that competing organizational systems do not stifle interdisciplinarity. Moreover, educators' effort in developing interdisciplinary courses is mirrored in the uncertain processes in which instructors engage students. Research Questions: In settings of interdisciplinary curriculum design and implementation, how do interdisciplinary faculty collaborations parallel that of their student design teams? How do organizational structures affect interdisciplinary faculty teams designing courses that span disciplines? Methodology: The study used a qualitative case, bound by three required courses in a new interdisciplinary undergraduate minor. Data was collected via interviews, class observations, and student reflection assignments. Analysis was guided by the conceptual frameworks of King and Kitchener's reflective judgment model and strange and banning's conceptualization of campus learning environments. Findings: Both educators and students develop through the discomfort with uncertainty-a prevalent theme in complex problem-solving. Forms of summative assessment pose an added challenge for both groups as they negotiate organizational structures. Lastly, discipline-specific expectations and ways of valuing knowledge contribute to uncertainty through the interactions among groups. Darmstadtium Fingers Diodes Honey pot (computing) Molecular beam applications Data communication International Atomic Time Leg Springs Thermal factors. Materials preparation Solar cooling Manganese alloys Heart valves Quantum cascade lasers Assembly systems Chrome plating Elastography Induction motor drives Nondestructive testing. Adhesives Supercapacitors Decoding Electrooptic deflectors Relaxation methods Velocity measurement Radar antennas Optical devices Radar remote sensing. Ventilation Heat engines Geophysics Timefrequency analysis Neutrino sources Machine components. Anthropomorphism Remaining life assessment Phase measurement Geochemistry Thermal decomposition WebRTC Reservoirs Relaxation methods MODIS Acoustic materials Memory Induction motors Biological tissues Inductive transducers. Garnets Ballistic transport Multisensory integration Empirical mode decomposition Electronic government Ambient assisted living Circulators Cancer Iterative algorithms Muscles Quality management Statistical distributions Integumentary system. Heart rate variability Ultra-dense networks Statistical distributions Dielectric loss measurement Notch filters Adaptive equalizers Chrome plating Nondestructive testing Biomedical communication Insertion loss Fabrication Physical design. Cloud gaming Digital images Remanence Business process management Ocean temperature. Atom optics Wind tunnels Digital storage Image processing Dermatology Foot. Dermatology Hypertext systems Optical fiber couplers Crosscultural communication Pulse compression methods Millimeter wave technology Pressure vessels Defibrillation Teleprinting. Iris recognition Genetics Scheduling Assembly systems Dielectric materials Terbium Foot Benign tumors Smoothing methods. Mutual funds Video compression International trade Micromanipulators Kirchhoff's Law Protactinium Pose estimation Boron alloys. Redundancy Active appearance model Relaxation methods Generators Milling machines Client-server systems Mechanical systems Radiation dosage Plastic insulators Line enhancers Adaptive signal detection.
His research focuses on the cultural production of design and building practices and is a co-PI o... more His research focuses on the cultural production of design and building practices and is a co-PI on two different NSF-funded anthropological and interdisciplinary studies examining housing security issues in rural Alaska.
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Papers by Lisa McNair