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Sharon Jones, associate professor of civil and environmental engineering, is going to be involved in a very different kind of research over the upcoming school year. Instead of focusing on a particular engineering problem or topic, Jones’ current project looks at engineering education as a whole and how teaching techniques and student recruitment can be improved.
Jones was Lafayette’s representative at the Institute for Scholarship on Engineering Education (ISEE) July 9-14 at Howard University in Washington D.C. ISEE is sponsored by the Center for the Advancement of Scholarship on Engineering Education (CAEE), which is funded by the National Science Foundation and run by a consortium of five schools – Colorado School of Mines, Howard University, Stanford University, University of Minnesota and University of Washington.
CAEE focuses on enhancing engineering students’ learning experiences and strengthening the research, leadership, and teaching skills of engineering faculty. One way this is done is through ISEE, where professors are shown how to conduct rigorous research on engineering education.
“The research methods are very different from what we use for our engineering research,” Jones says, “Research on engineering education is a fairly new field where we have a lot to learn.”
This is actually the third annual institute, but the first one that was opened up to faculty outside of the five CAEE schools. In all, 17 colleges and universities attended the conference. The majority of the schools were large research institutions and Jones was the only representative from a private, liberal arts college.
This year’s theme was “nation as laboratory” and focused on addressing engineering’s educational needs in the 21st century, specifically diversity.
Jones says, “[The theme] asks the questions: ‘What do we know about our students and what brings them to engineering and keeps them there? What can we learn about ways to impact institutional cultures? What are key principles behind exemplary programs that can scale up or adapt to other settings?”
Jones’ specific project is focusing on the effects an intensive, structured mentoring program will have on the performance of first year engineering students from urban, public, high schools.
She is going to use the Posse Foundation as a model for her research. Posse identifies, recruits, and trains student leaders from urban public high schools to form multicultural teams called “posses.” Teams enroll at top-tier colleges and universities nationwide to pursue their academics and help promote cross-cultural communication. Members of Lafayette’s first posse graduated in May.
“I plan to look at how the Posse program helps students achieve both academic and campus-wide success during the first year,” says Jones.
Jones will be asking for the help of other Lafayette faculty over the school year and will recruit an EXCEL scholar to help with the study.
ISEE activities will also continue during the academic year to facilitate each participant’s project. The research will culminate with a final Leadership Meeting of Scholars in fall 2007 to present results.
“I hope that this study will help the college develop additional programs to improve the success of all our engineering students,” Jones says.