IUSE/PFE: RED Innovation: Engineering in Action: A Systems Thinking Framework to Develop Reflective and Values-Driven Civil and Environmental Engineers

This project will transform the professional formation of engineers in the Department of Civil, Environmental and Geodetic Engineering (CEGE) at The Ohio State University by using systems thinking principles and principles of "Engineering in Action" to reorganize its undergraduate teaching culture and policies. "Engineering in Action" is based on engineering doing that is technically proficient (with well-developed professional skills of teamwork and communication), engineering thinking that is ethically and professionally responsible, and engineering being that is reflective and values driven. Civil and environmental engineering degrees are broad-based degrees that position graduates for success in other related career fields, such as advanced manufacturing and biotechnology, respectively. Civil and environmental engineering practice provides important physical infrastructure (buildings, water, energy) required by US industry in fields including computing and AI, biotechnology, and advanced manufacturing. Like other engineering disciplines historically, civil and environmental engineering undergraduate education have struggled with (1) siloed approaches to curricular development that emphasize technical knowledge, (2) gaps in faculty training to implement high-impact teaching practices, and (3) implicit learning structures that shape student and faculty values and beliefs regarding holistic professional skill training. By the end of the project period, this department will produce annual cohorts of CEGE graduates (including a thousand students over the course of the project) who are better prepared to tackle contemporary infrastructure challenges – ones that require CEGE engineers who can think holistically, collaborate across disciplines, and act with a strong sense of responsibility to society. The department will bring about this outcome using an organizational change model that they will share with other CEGE engineering departments across the country. The cultural change from this department on its own students, and the models and tools which the project will share will improve the education of subsequent CEGE engineering students at Ohio State and across adopting schools, improving the technical workforce in the nation in both numbers and skills. In this project, faculty will leverage systems thinking principles to examine how curriculum, instruction, institutional culture and industry expectations – both explicit and tacit – interact, and to identify leverage points for change. In so doing, they will develop a departmental-scale model of the impact of such organizational systems on student learning and professional identity development. In addition, by examining and addressing tacit knowledge, including the unspoken norms and values that shape student experiences, the project will contribute to educational environments that better enable all Americans to be able to contribute to the future of the profession. The project particularly draws on Kotter's change theory, Lewin's Force Field Analysis, and Deming's PDSA (Plan-Do-Study-Act) cycle to first implement workshops providing faculty systems leadership training, then themed Faculty Learning Communities (along with industry partners) to collaboratively redesign targeted course sequences and curricular content and policies. The project will then institutionalize the changes through updating governance documents and other departmental policies and practices identified through the systems thinking analysis step. The project has a concurrent mixed-methods (survey and interviews) research design collecting and analyzing data longitudinally over the life of the project to better understand individual and perceived cultural values students and faculty place on various professional and technical skills needed in engineering. The team will work with an evaluator for formative and summative evaluation, and with the Ohio State University Leadership Center to support faculty NSF Award ID: 2550816 | Program: 04002627DB NSF STEM Education,01002627DB NSF RESEARCH & RELATED ACTIVIT | Principal Investigator: Allison MacKay | Institution: OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY, THE, COLUMBUS, OH | Award Amount: $2,000,000 View on NSF Award Search: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/show-award/?AWD_ID=2550816 View on Research.gov: https://www.research.gov/awardapi-service/v1/awards/2550816.html