Engineering and society: Embedding active service learning in undergraduate curricula

Fogg Rogers, Laura; Fowles-Sweet, Wendy

Abstract

Undergraduate education incorporating active learning through education outreach presents a critical opportunity to influence future engineering teaching and practice capabilities. Engineering education outreach activities have been shown to have multiple benefits; increasing interest and engagement with science and engineering for school children, providing teachers with expert contributions to engineering subject knowledge, and developing professional generic skills for engineers such as communication and teamwork. A new module at the University of the West of England, Bristol (UWE), called Engineering and Society, paired 45 student engineers and 32 pre-service teachers to enact engineering outreach in primary schools, reaching over 900 children in 30 school classes. A pre and post longitudinal mixed methods design is being employed to measure change in attitudes and Education Outreach Self-Efficacy in student engineers; alongside attitudes, Teaching Engineering Self-Efficacy and Engineering Subject Knowledge Confidence in pre-service teachers. Previous pilot research indicates that highly significant improvements were noted in the pre-service teachers’ confidence and self-efficacy; while both the teachers and engineers qualitatively described benefits arising from the paired peer mentor model.

• Acceptance Date: Apr 20, 2018
• Publication Date: Apr 20, 2018
• Deposit Date: Jul 26, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: Jul 26, 2018
• Journal: Time for Change
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Pages: 125-129
• Book Title: 5TH Annual Symposium of the United Kingdom & Ireland Engineering Education Research Network
• ISBN: 978185449443-6
• Keywords: engineering, public engagement, outreach, teacher education, engineering education research
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/869286
• Related Public URLs: http://nrl.northumbria.ac.uk/33707/
• Contract Date: Jul 26, 2018