Connecting Research to the Broader Community: Developing and Implementing a Graduate Course Across an Engineering Research Center's Partner Universities

Research output: Contribution to journalConference articlepeer-review

Abstract

The Center for Bio-mediated and Bio-inspired Geotechnics (CBBG), a National Science Foundation (NSF) third generation (Gen-3) Engineering Research Center (ERC), developed, implemented, and evaluated across its four partner universities and a fifth invited university a one-credit graduate-level course on connecting research to the broader community. The curriculum developed for this course is aimed at educating graduate and senior-year undergraduate students on the skills necessary to connect their research to broader technical and non-technical issues within the engineering profession and the global community. Content is aligned with the Center's and the NSF ERC program's shared goal of educating students in five areas: Entrepreneurship, Life Cycle Sustainability Assessment, Leadership, Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, and Professional Development. The five-week, one-credit course was developed through collaboration among faculty at each of the partner universities. The course included both synchronous and asynchronous components delivered through video conferencing and a common learning management system to students from the four partner institutions, Arizona State University, Georgia Institute of Technology, University of California - Davis, and New Mexico State University, and from a fifth invited participating university, the University of Washington. The course was initially launched during the 2020 Fall semester with 30 students. To measure the Center's strategic goal of developing students with the desired skills and preparing them to be successful in industry and academia upon graduation, the mastery of the curriculum by the students was evaluated by an external evaluation team through a web-based survey. Findings from this survey, along with modifications and adjustments that were incorporated into the curriculum when the course was offered again in Fall 2021, are discussed herein.

Original languageEnglish (US)
JournalASEE Annual Conference and Exposition, Conference Proceedings
StatePublished - Aug 23 2022
Event129th ASEE Annual Conference and Exposition: Excellence Through Diversity, ASEE 2022 - Minneapolis, United States
Duration: Jun 26 2022Jun 29 2022

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Engineering(all)

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