FUTURE SKILL DEVELOPMENT IN UNDERGRADUATE STUDENTS THROUGH WORK IN STEM OUTREACH

This paper represents the experience and self-reported skill development of undergraduate Science and Engineering outreach instructors, who were working primarily online during the global pandemic in 2020. This work is part of a larger multi-year project designed to articulate the learning and employability skills gained by a pan-Canadian group of undergraduates, by way of theirtraining and work experience as youth program Instructors delivering STEM outreach activities for youth. The development of these skills was measured using a post-program survey, in which undergraduate instructors were asked a number of questions about their skill development. Instructors noted development most significantly in (1) teamwork and collaboration; (2) adaptability and flexibility: (3) communication, (4) leadership, (5) innovation and creativity, and (6)initiative. A significant theme noted was the learning that took place from the sudden shift to teaching remotely and working through a pandemic. Although the focus of STEM Outreach research & evaluation is often on the impact of the program on its participants, this work demonstrates the value of the instructor experience, and how this work can leverage other post-secondary initiatives designed to prepare undergraduates for their careers.

ANALYSIS OF HOW CAPSTONE TEAMS DEFINE ENGINEERING DESIGN FAILURE

There is a growing trend in engineering education to increase the societal awareness among theengineering graduates, so that the engineering solutions proposed by the engineers are more sustainable. To achieve this, one of the efforts in Concordia University is to ask capstone students to discuss and implement (wherever possible) ethical, legal, social, environmental, and entrepreneurial aspects of their capstone design. Students are given two lectures during the capstone year which provides them with prompts to identify and think beyond their personal biases and perceptions of the society. At the end of the term, each capstone team is asked to define engineering failure. The aim for this is for graduating students to have a well thought of idea of the engineering design failure before they enter the workplace. This article explains the two phases (lectures) of the capstone lectures related to the ethical, legal, societal, environmental, and entrepreneurial aspects of an engineering design. Additionally, the article aims to analyze the definitions of engineering failure submitted by the engineering students at the end of the capstone year to identify keywords and terms that the graduating engineering students attribute to success and failure of an engineering design. The objective of the paper is to open the discussion among engineering educators for incorporating ideas in their courses that can improve engineering students’ understanding of a sustainable design and assess the success of these strategies.

COVID-19: A MOTIVATOR FOR CHANGE IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION?

Despite recent research and initiatives, learner-centered instructional practices have not made their way into post-secondary Science, Technology,Engineering and Math (STEM) classrooms, even though there is clear evidence showing the benefits include increased grades, higher student engagement, and deeper learning. STEM educators rank the barriers associated with active learning higher than their colleagues in other disciplines, and identify the inability to cover all the content as a key factor in their decision to adhere to didactic practices. Insights and instructional strategies and methods garnered from teaching-related faculty development opportunities are often tried, but their use is not generally sustained unless a personal experiencedrives that change in practice. Unquestionably, COVID-19 has had an immediate, global impact on higher education. Educators have been forced to alter their teaching practices to accommodate the switch to remote learning. Most Teaching and Learning Centers offered myriad workshops to facilitate this change. This quantitative study set out to determine if COVID-19 precautions created the personal experience necessary to initiate a change in STEM teaching practices. Using educator-related threshold concepts as a framework, it analyzed institutional registration records to determine the type of faculty development opportunitieschosen by engineering educators, and the extent to which they participated in those related to learner-centered instructional practices for remote delivery.Analysis shows that engineering educators participated proportionally less than their colleagues in other disciplines, and there is an indication that the pandemic may facilitate an ongoing change in the teaching practices of engineering educators. Opportunities for enhancing faculty development practices for engineering educators are proposed.

AN ADAPTED ENGINEERING DESIGN PROCESS: GUIDING TOUCHSTONES

The field of engineering needs to develop while healing our relations with the lands, waters, and living systems. Fostering ethical spaces where Indigenous ways of knowing and being and western worldviews can hold space together, and cease to separate the technical from the social, are key to progressing equitably as a society. In the field of engineering within Turtle Island, it is essential that we adapt the engineering design process to reflect this. Following the execution of an Engineering and Architecture transdisciplinary Design Build course at University of Manitoba, and in partnership with the Shoal Lake No. 40 First Nation, it was acknowledged by stakeholders that further analysis of this project could establish lessons learned. This paper speaks to engineering education practice. The objective of this research is to develop recommendations for how the engineering design process can make space for Indigenous ways of knowing and being. Shoal Lake No. 40 community members, one engineering contractor, and four university faculty members were asked their perspectives on the development and implementation of two projects conducted with the community members and on the First Nation lands. Through the co-analysis of these open-ended discussions, recommendations were developed for how the engineering design process can integrate four touchstones external to the design process. The touchstones enable an engineer to perceive the design process and establish core intentions for a project that creates space for Indigenous values and principles and western worldviews.

USING ACTOR NETWORK THEORY TO EXPLORE SUSTAINABILITY ISSUES IN AN ENGINEERING & SOCIETY COURSE

This paper explores the use of Actor-Network Theory as a tool for exploring the complexity ofsustainability issues in a core Engineering and Society course for second-year students in a large,multidisciplinary engineering program. In the course, Actor Network Theory, which is a method for analyzing sociotechnical issues with an emphasis on the concept of power and its distribution, was introduced to the students through a series of learning activities and an assignment, initially encouraging the students to apply the approach to a system within their own life. Subsequently, the approach was used to analyze complex sociotechnical issues, for example, the use of Coal-based energy in Nova Scotia, and the Coastal Gaslink pipeline dispute in the Wet’suwet'enterritory. This paper describes our approach to introducing Actor Network Theory to engineering students, the benefits and limitations of the approach, and the efficacy of the approach for exploring sustainability issues. Other instructors may consider the introduction of ActorNetwork Theory through courses in Engineering & Society and Engineering Design.

EFFECT OF MENTORSHIP ON THE EARLY ENTREPRENEURIAL JOURNEY OF UNIVERSITY STUDENTS

Acknowledging the value of entrepreneurs in today’s society, universities are looking into mentorship to improve their support system for students considering entrepreneurship as a viable career path after graduation. This paper reports the main findings of a systematic literaturereview aimed at understanding the role that mentorship plays during the early entrepreneurial journey of university students. That is, identifying what motivates students to seek mentorship and recognizing the critical elements of successful mentorship programs that develop robustmentor-mentee relationships. The systematic literature review classified the selected articles into three thematic categories: mentoring in entrepreneurship, gender differences in mentoring, and mentorship programs in business incubation. Findings in the combined categories suggest that a positive mentoring experience depends on the mentor’s credibility and connection inthe business world and the mentee’s perception of similarities between their mentor and themselves.

PERFORMING SCIENCE: SCIENCE COMMUNICATION AS PERFORMATIVE EVENT

A course at the University of Toronto encourages engineering students to analyze how science isconveyed in the popular media through a variety of contexts. An analysis of the language and rhetoric of these communicative acts provides on entry point into how science is framed, while the discipline of performance studies, which identifies and analyzes the mechanisms with which we present our messages and ourselves, provides another useful tool through which to understand the motivations and associated strategies behind scientific communication. This teaching practice paper presents three case studies of scientific press conferences used in the course: NASA’s 2010 astrobiology event, the Higgs Boson announcement in 2012, and Virgin Galactic’s 2014 SpaceShipTwo crash. These three case studies illustrate how the act of communicating science within public spaces should be navigated with an awareness of the intended message and the way that this message is conveyed and perceived. Each case study includes a summary of observations on the event (generated and shared through class discussions), and prompts that will enable theeffective instruction of these and other case studies.

COORDINATING THE INSTRUCTION OF FOUR ONLINE COURSES

The University of British Columbia Vantage College offers a pathway for academically qualified international students who do not yet meet the English language admission requirements fordirect entry into UBC. In the summer of 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, we taught four courses to a cohort of 64 students scattered across the globe. The courses were taught online and asynchronously, raising coordination challenges in terms of class schedule and delivery, assessment, and student support. To address those challenges, we developed a highly structured weekly schedule, specifying lecture and assessment days, as well as regular, synchronous office hours. We met weekly to keep each other updated about the progress of students. Students falling behind in multiple courses were reported in an “early alert” system: a university-specific resource through which students are contacted by health and wellness staff. A midterm survey was conducted and the feedback was generally positive. Final results in the courses were varied, with some comparable

LEARNING NOT BURNING (OUT): SUSTAINABLE TIME MANAGEMENT IN ENGINEERING EDUCATION

In recent years, there has been some concern raised regarding decreased mental health andwellbeing and increased reports of surface-learning tendencies in Canadian engineering students. Prior papers have noted possible links between these trends and the manner in which students use their time. Having completed a study on student time use, this paper presents some initial results – including a frequency assessment of reasons for student absences – which seem to support some of the previously hypothesized systemic problems. Following this, an overview of institution- andinstructor-imposed constraints precedes a discussion on how these constraints may be contributing to student time use difficulties, and ultimately to decreased wellbeing and learning capacity. A sampling of possible interventions are then presented, and important validity considerations for conducting such research are discussed. Research into the efficacy of these interventions, due to lack of existing empirical proof, should be conducted.

USING INDIVIDUAL-BASED MODELING TO BETTER UNDERSTAND THE HIDDEN CURRICULUM OF ENGINEERING

Engineering culture perpetuates norms that are unwelcoming to minoritized identities, particularlywomen and racialized folks. A theory useful for understanding this is “hidden curriculum” whichdescribes the assumptions and beliefs that are unintentionally and implicitly taught in engineeringeducation. This paper outlines an initial conceptual model for using IBM (individual-based modeling) to better understand the hidden curriculum of engineering. We provide an overview of the driving question behind the model design, the agents and their attributes, the rules andprocesses which change these attributes, and the scale of the model. This overview of the model building process provides insight into the model design for simulating and better understanding the perpetuation of the hidden curriculum within engineering education.