Browsing by Author "Reid, Kenneth J."

Now showing 1 - 8 of 8
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    An Exploration of Students' Interests in Pursuing Careers in Environmental Sustainability
    Griesinger, Tina Marie (Virginia Tech, 2023-11-29)
    Although more people are transitioning into environmental sustainability careers, there is still a demand. This presents an opportunity for undergraduate engineering students to satisfy the demand for environmental sustainability professionals. The purpose of this qualitative exploratory study was to explore environmental sustainability learning experiences, from small in-class experiences to internships, and future career choices. By utilizing the social cognitive theory (SCCT) as a theoretical lens, this study explored participants' environmental sustainability interests, learning experiences related to environmental sustainability and their interest in pursuing a future career in environmental sustainability. This research addresses a gap in the existing literature by exploring how undergraduate engineering students' environmental sustainability learning experiences impact their decisions to pursue careers in this field, framed by the SCCT. The perspectives of twenty-five undergraduate engineering students in various engineering disciplines at Virginia Tech, an R1 public university in Blacksburg, Virginia. The participants were enrolled in ENGR3124, Introduction to Green Engineering, during the Fall 2022 semester and were interviewed for the study. Semi-structured online interviews were conducted via Zoom, allowing students to provide detailed information about their learning experiences and future career plans. Data was analyzed to (1) identify students' interest in pursuing a career in environmental sustainability (2) determine if students' interests have changed since they began their undergraduate studies (3) explore how learning experiences have impacted the students' future career choice. The findings discover that exposure to environmental sustainability learning experiences plays a meaningful role in impacting students' interests in pursuing careers in sustainability. Results reveal that factors such as personal values and salary considerations inspire career choices. Outcomes from this research suggest that promoting a connection between engineering education and environmental sustainability can inspire future engineers to actively pursue environmental sustainability careers and find solutions to sustainability issues. This underscores the significance of integrating sustainability experiences, such as a current events discussion in class or projects with an environmental sustainability element, into undergraduate engineering education. This research contributes to addressing the growing demand for people to address environmental sustainability issues, highlighting the role of learning experiences in shaping students' career interests. Further research in this area will be necessary for further developing strategies to encourage students to pursue sustainability-related careers and contribute to environmental sustainability initiatives.
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    Exploring Cyber Ranges in Cybersecurity Education
    Beauchamp, Cheryl Lynn (Virginia Tech, 2022-04-01)
    According to a report from McAfee, the global cost of cybercrime for 2020 was over one trillion dollars (Smith, Z. et al., 2020). Cybersecurity breaches and attacks have not only cost businesses and organizations millions of dollars but have also threatened national security and critical infrastructure. Examples include the Ransomware attack in May of 2021 on the largest fuel pipeline in the United States and the February 2021 remote access system breach of a Florida water treatment facility which raised sodium hydroxide to a lethal level. Improving cybersecurity requires a skilled workforce with relevant knowledge and skills. Academic degree programs, boot camps, and various certification programs provide education and training to assist this need. Cyber ranges are a more recent development to provide hands-on skill training. These ranges, often virtual, provide a safe and accessible environment to improve practical skills and experience through hands-on application. They provide a training environment to identify threats, apply countermeasures, and secure data from risks separately from the organization's actual network. More and more academic programs utilize cyber ranges due to the perceived benefit of integrating them into their cybersecurity-related programs. Academic cyber ranges offer virtualized environments that support cybersecurity educators' needs to provide students with a safe, separated, and engaging environment. The purpose of my research has two components: 1) to understand who the educators are using academic-facing cyber ranges and how they are using them to support their cybersecurity education efforts, and 2) to understand how cybersecurity educators and students are motivated by using them. Specifically, my research is comprised of three manuscripts: (1) a mixed-method exploratory study of who are the educators using cyber ranges for cybersecurity education and how they are using them to create significant cybersecurity learning experiences, (2) a mixed-method study exploring the motivation of educators using a cyber range for cybersecurity education, and (3) a mixed-method study exploring student motivation participating in cybersecurity CTF competitions. The three manuscripts contribute to understanding cyber ranges in cybersecurity education. The results from my research provided insight from the users of these cyber ranges, cybersecurity educators and students. Results from my first manuscript suggested that high school cybersecurity educators are the primary users. These educators have less formal cybersecurity education and experience compared to cybersecurity educators in higher education. The data also showed that cybersecurity educators primarily used cyber ranges for teaching and learning to meet learning goals and objectives. Results from my second manuscript suggested that educators were motivated mainly by the importance of using a cyber range for cybersecurity education and for the interest-enjoyment their students experience from cyber range usage. Educators found using the cyber range made their class more engaging and relevant to their students.These educators were also confident they could use a cyber range and learn how to use it. However, those without prior experience in cybersecurity or previous experience using a cyber range shared they needed instructor-facing resources, professional development opportunities, and time to learn. Results from my third manuscript suggested that students were motivated by the importance of participating in a cybersecurity CTF competition. Many reported that participating was useful for developing professional skills and readiness. Although CTF competitions were considered difficult and stressful, students did not consider the difficulty pejorative. Many shared that challenging CTFs contributed towards the enjoyment of participating, making them a rewarding and worthwhile experience. However, students also shared that academic and team support contributed towards their confidence in competing. In contrast, those who did not report confidence, stated they lacked a team strategy or support from their academic institution. Additionally, they did not know what to expect to prepare before the competition event. Overall, the results of this dissertation highlight the importance of prior preparation for educators and student CTF participants. For educators, this prior preparation includes curriculum supporting resources such as content mapping to learning objectives and professional development opportunities that do not assume any prior knowledge or experience. For students, prior preparation includes understanding what to expect and recommendations for academic and team support.
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    Identifying Asymmetries in Web-based Transfer Student Information that is Believed to be Correct using Fully Integrated Mixed Methods
    Reeping, David Patrick (Virginia Tech, 2019-12-04)
    Transfer between community colleges and four-year institutions has become more common as student mobility increases. Accordingly, the higher education system has coped with the fluidity by establishing articulation agreements that facilitate pathways from one institution to another. The forward-facing policies and guides to inform students on those pathways are known to be complicated, leading to the development of web-based tools like Transferology to help students navigate the system. Still, credit loss is common, whether through misunderstandings, lack of awareness, or changing degree plans. A proliferation of literature examines the experiences of transfer students and other agents in the process like community college advisors, but few pieces interrogate the underlying website structures that facilitate those experiences as the unit of analysis. Information related to facilitating transfer from one institution to another is often fragmented across multiple webpages or policies and uses language not optimal for communicating with students – creating what are called "information asymmetries" between the students and institutions. The premise of an exchange having information asymmetries is that one or more parties in the exchange have more or better information than the others, leading to an imbalance in power. In the case of higher education, transfer students – and their advisors by extension – can be subjected to manipulation by the invisible hands of the four-year institutions through language gaps and scattered sources of information. Accordingly, this dissertation explored four-year university websites, a major point of contact students have with information on transfer, to address the following main research question: "How are information asymmetries in curricular policies/procedures apparent for engineering students on institutional webpages in terms of language and fragmentation?" The subsequent research question synthesized the results of the first question: "Looking across information asymmetry measures, what are the different narratives of information asymmetry that integrate themes of language and fragmentation across institutions?" A fully integrated mixed methods design using all existing data was employed to address the two research questions. A stratified random sample was taken with respect to institution size based on their Carnegie classifications (n = 38). The collection of relevant public webpages based on a set of keywords from the sampled institutions was transformed into three network measures - hierarchy, centrality, and nonlinear – that were used in cluster analyses to group the institutions based on their information structures. Sequential mixed methods sampling was used to choose institutions purposefully from each cluster based on notable features recorded during the first stage of data collection. Two-cycle coding followed the cluster analysis by elaborating on the networks formed during data collection. I used joint displays to organize the networks and In-Vivo codes in the same picture and develop themes related to fragmentation and language simultaneously. K-means and K-medoids cluster methods both produced the same four cluster solution illustrating one aspect of information asymmetries through fragmentation. The clustering solution highlighted four major network patterns, plus one cluster mixing two of the patterns: 1) linear browsing, 2) centralized expansive browsing, 3) branched browsing, and 4) mixed browsing. Further qualitative analysis of the sampled institutions revealed several types of missteps where information is obscured through language or dispersed in the network. I explored a subset of 16 institutions and identified four themes related to fragmentation (unlinked divergence, progressive disclosure, lack of uniformity, and neighborhood linking) and six themes related to language (hedging transferability and applicability, legalese handwaving, building rapport, exclusivity, deviance from common practice, and defining terms). The missteps were contextualized further using six narratives with institutional examples. This work characterized the information design for transfer students as a messy web of loosely connected structures with language that complicates understanding. Integrated narratives illustrate a landscape of loosely coupled information structures that become more expansive as state initiatives interact with already existing local agreements. Moreover, institutional websites describing transfer processes use communication strategies similar to private companies writing online privacy policies. In light of the themes of information asymmetries, opportunities for supporting transfer were highlighted. For example, institutions are encouraged to create visual representations of the transfer credit process, ensure terms are defined upfront while minimizing jargon, and avoid linking to information that is easily summarizable on the current page. This research would be of interest to institutions looking to improve the presentation of their transfer information by critically examining their designs for the missteps described here. In addition, engineering education practitioners and researchers studying transfer student pathways and experiences will find the results of interest – especially in considering how to support the students despite the large information gaps. Finally, those looking to implement a fully integrated mixed methods design or use existing/archival data in their own context will find the use of mixing strategies of interest.
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    The Influences of First-Year Engineering Matriculation Structures on Electrical and Computer Engineering Students' Self-Efficacy
    Lewis, Racheida Sharde (Virginia Tech, 2019-11-22)
    While first-year engineering (FYE) programs have grown dramatically over the last 30 years, they take a variety of different structures. However, few if any, researchers and FYE program developers has considered how program structure, and specifically matriculation, impacts retention – an issue that continues to be of concern as we seek to grown the national engineering workforce. Low retention rates combined with lack of diversity becomes even more acute when considering the field of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) which ranks as one of the least diverse engineering disciplines. One factor that has been shown to support retention is self-efficacy or individuals' beliefs in their ability to succeed. Therefore, to help address the retention issues in ECE, this dissertation explores the programmatic influence of first-year engineering matriculation structures on self-efficacy development in electrical and computer engineering students. In particular, it compares declared engineering (DE) programs, which admit students to a specific engineering field, to general engineering (GE) programs, in which students are admitted to engineering but do not select a specific engineering field until after their first year. Using qualitative and quantitative methodologies, this dissertation presents three manuscripts: 1) a quantitative secondary analysis comparing competency beliefs in a GE program and a quasi- DE first-year engineering program for ECE students; 2) a qualitative secondary analysis of self-efficacy development in a DE first-year program; and 3) a qualitative analysis exploring similarities and differences in self-efficacy development in EE students at two universities, one with a DE program and one with a GE program. The exploratory studies resulted in findings that demonstrate strong similarities in self-efficacy development in students from the DE and GE programs. Those differences that did emerge are largely attributed to how self-efficacy is discussed by students: 1) self-efficacy is developed differently between the two programs because the tasks associated with each program are different; 2) GE students discuss self-efficacy more broadly regarding engineering in general, focusing on domains like professional skills; 3) DE students discuss self-efficacy development more narrowly, specifically related to being an electrical or computer engineer. Additionally, the findings from study 2 suggest that pedagogical structures may be more important regarding self-efficacy development than matriculation structures. These results broaden our understanding of how FYE programs impact self-efficacy development within the context of a specific major, but still lend themselves to further exploration regarding factors most related to persistence and the experiences of underrepresented minorities in engineering.
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    A Quantitative Analysis of First Year Engineering Students' Courses Perceptions and Motivational Beliefs in Two Introductory Engineering Courses
    Virguez Barroso, Lilianny Josefina (Virginia Tech, 2018-02-27)
    As a national initiative to support retention of engineering students, engineering programs have undergone a surge of revisions to their coursework in recent years, most notably in relation to first-year programs. These program modifications are generally intended to enhance student success in engineering, including both students' achievement and students' motivation to persist in an engineering degree. This study examines motivational constructs as it compares two versions (standard and revised) of an introductory engineering course taught in a general first year engineering program. The purpose of this dissertation is to examine students' course perceptions, students' Expectancy-Value beliefs, and the relationship between perceptions and beliefs in the two versions of an introductory engineering course. Students' perceptions of the class were measured at the course level using the MUSIC model of Academic Motivation, and students' Expectancy-Value beliefs were measured within the engineering domain level using Expectancy-value theory. The dissertation is divided into three stages: In the first stage I provide a quantitative comparison of students' perceptions of the course, from students enrolled in each of the two versions of the course. In the second stage, I describe comparisons of Expectancy-Value engineering-related beliefs between students in each of the two versions of the introductory course, as well as within students in one of the courses. In the third stage, I develop structural models to test the relationship between students' perceptions of the introductory engineering courses and their Expectancy-Value engineering-related beliefs. This study suggests three main outcomes: First, students' perceptions of success and caring are statistically and significantly different between the two versions of the course. Second, students' Expectancy-Value beliefs are discovered to have declined significantly in the standard version of the course, whereas in the revised version of the course, there are no statistically significant differences. Third, the fit indices of the models suggest a good model data-fit providing strong support for the hypothesis that students' perceptions of introductory engineering courses have effect on students' broader motivational beliefs. These outcomes have practical implications for students, instructors, and researchers in first year engineering education.
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    Teacher Pedagogical Choice: Analyzing Engineering Professional Development Programs and COVID in Middle School Science Classrooms
    Garcia-Sheridan, Joshua Alexei (Virginia Tech, 2023-01-25)
    Engineering education is increasingly becoming considered an important component of STEM integration in formal pre-college settings. Professional development programs take a significant role in helping teachers develop necessary classroom practices to integrate engineering into their curriculum. The COVID pandemic has further complicated instructional conditions, necessitating emergency remote learning methods to continue instruction amidst safety concerns. Combined with a general struggle to scaffold integration of engineering in K-12 classrooms, emergent conditions that restrict instructional choices such as pandemics threaten to repeatedly aggravate future efforts and make it prudent to consider the pedagogical choices teachers are able to make for STEM integration and what future professional development programs should try to do with teachers to enable them. This research aims to describe and explain the conditions and dynamics related to teacher pedagogical choice to employ engineering design activities in their classes both within the context of a partnership program and during the COVID pandemic. Using end-of-program semi-structured interviews with participant teachers in the VT PEERS (Virginia Tech Partnering with Educators and Engineers in Rural Schools) program collected in the midst of the pandemic, data was coded with a focus upon identifying connections with a dynamic framework for pedagogical choice as well as identifying and explaining the expansion of practices in the two contexts. The coding process yielded a set of themes for conditions and developments teachers experienced in the process of conducting classes with changes induced by the program and by measures in response to COVID. Findings from the study show that teachers with supports that overcome or nullify inhibitive factors for pedagogical choice will be able to adopt and develop innovative practices. Teachers balance proposed changes with their own sense of professional expectations influenced by internalized, structural, and cultural conceptions of their work. Remote learning modalities and COVID-induced safety measures constrained the ability to teach according to familiar principles of instruction, harming teachers' beliefs and development in the practice of the modalities. Based on these findings, the framework for teacher pedagogical choice showed VT PEERS' effectiveness in its opening presentation and execution to set the stage for teachers to make innovative choices to employ engineering activities, yet it was not as useful in describing how the remote learning measures taken during COVID would not lead to expanded practices for that modality. Thus, there is a need for a model that includes complex interactions between the teachers and their environment that promote or inhibit teacher agency. Such a model would inform a more empowering design and execution of professional development initiatives than feature-dependent frameworks. COVID also demonstrates that preparation will be necessary to equip teachers with more efficacious and flexible practices for remote learning to prevent further damage to student outcomes given that the potential for recurring pandemic conditions in the future makes remote learning more of an expectation than an emergency.
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    Understanding Empathy in the Experiences of Undergraduate Engineering Students in Service-Learning Programs
    Yeaman, Adetoun Oludara (Virginia Tech, 2020-06-17)
    In an increasingly globalized world and with rapid advancement in technology, there is a need to grapple more intently with social implications of engineering and technology. In the engineering community, these trends direct us to more critically consider how engineering and technology affect humanity and to interact effectively in diverse populations. Empathy, an ability that is central to the process of understanding and considering others, has been recognized as a valuable competency in the education of engineers. In engineering education specifically, several studies have pursued definition of empathy in the engineering context and its importance in engineering curriculum. Studies suggest that service learning is a useful pedagogical approach for supporting students in the development of social competencies, including empathy. However, it is not clear how this development happens. In this dissertation, I sought to understand engineering students' experiences in a service-learning context to learn the ways in which empathy emerged in their descriptions and the elements of participants' experiences that shaped their empathy development. My participants were fourteen engineering students from two institutions, a small private university and a large public university, with both groups involved in at least one-semester of a service-learning course. I describe my phenomenological approach to this investigation and share my findings. Notably, I found eight main themes in my investigation of the role of empathy within the service-learning experiences described namely: changing perspective about others, having a sense of responsibility to others, keeping an open mind, inquiring of stakeholders, seeing others' points of view, understanding others' situations, being able to adjust goals and compromise and recognizing and/or welcoming difference. Additionally, I found both elements of participants' experiences designed into the course and those that were unprecedented relevant in shaping their empathy development. I also discuss the implications of these findings for engineering education and practice.
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    Understanding the Relationships Between Disability, Engineering, and the Design of Engineering Course Websites Through Disabled Engineering Students' Perspectives
    Spingola, Elizabeth Marie (Virginia Tech, 2020-04-15)
    This dissertation examines the culture and climate of disabled people and the disability community within society and the engineering field and the experience of disabled students in higher education. The theoretical lenses utilized is the Technology Acceptance Model which emphasizes the importance of end user's perspectives, and the Social Model of Disability which sees the world and society as disabling rather than the imposition of disability on a person. The perception of disability in engineering is examined through the use of a systematic literature review within Chapter 3 by comparing general engineering academic literature and engineering education literature housed within the American Society of Engineering Education national database. Chapter 4 of this dissertation quantitatively examines the digital accessibility landscape of learning management systems utilized within engineering and engineering related courses that first and second year engineering students are required to take. Finally, Chapter 5 utilized a mixed method approach to examine disabled and non-disabled engineering students' perspectives on the usability of their Learning Management System within their engineering courses. The second part of this research study utilizes individual design interviews to have students redesign their Canvas experiences such that it minimizes digital accessibility barriers. Chapter 6 details tangible digital accessibility recommendations for developers, designers, and instructors/content managers. These recommendations are based on the results within the previous chapters of this dissertation.