Teaching-Focused Faculty and Their Pedagogical Practices in Middle and Upper-Level Engineering Courses

Abstract

Teaching-focused faculty carry a substantial share of the undergraduate engineering teaching mission, particularly in advanced coursework, yet little is known about how they draw on professional knowledge and navigate institutional structures in research-focused contexts. To address this gap, my dissertation examined the pedagogical practices of full-time teaching-focused Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) faculty and the conditions that shape their instructional work. While prior research has documented the growing presence of teaching-focused faculty in engineering education, their teaching decision-making in middle and upper-level courses at research-focused institutions remains underexplored. This study was grounded in a synthesized theoretical framework that integrates Gess-Newsome's Teacher Professional Knowledge and Skills (TPKandS) model with Burridge's sociological perspective on teaching practice. Using this framework, I conducted a qualitative study of nine full-time teaching-focused ECE faculty at a large R1 university. The study employed classroom observations, semi-structured interviews, and course document analysis to examine the overarching question: How do full-time teaching-focused ECE faculty teach middle and upper-level undergraduate courses? Data analysis involved iterative qualitative coding and thematic analysis to identify patterns in instructional decision-making and the sociological forces shaping pedagogical enactment. My findings demonstrate that teaching-focused faculty relied on interconnected domains of professional and topic-specific knowledge to design learning experiences that balanced conceptual rigor, application-oriented tasks, and student support. Participants described dynamically adapting explanations, calibrating task complexity, and leveraging experiential and practice-based pedagogies to address the cognitive demands of middle and upper-level ECE content. These instructional choices reflected knowledge-in-use rather than static expertise, with faculty continuously adjusting their approaches in response to student needs and course context. At the same time, broader sociological forces functioned as amplifiers and filters of pedagogical agency. Ontological security, routinization, and time-space constraints related to class size, curriculum structure, available teaching support, student preparedness, evaluation system and institutional policy, etc. shaped how instructional intentions were enacted. These forces sometimes supported stability and efficiency in teaching practice, while at other times constrained opportunities for innovation and deeper student engagement. These findings illuminate the complex interplay between knowledge, context, and structure in teaching-focused roles within engineering education. This dissertation contributes new insights into the work of teaching-focused faculty in research-focused engineering programs by foregrounding how professional knowledge and institutional conditions jointly shape advanced undergraduate teaching. Implications point to the need for institutional policies, workload structures, and professional development efforts that better support instructional adaptability and recognize the multifaceted contributions of teaching-focused engineering faculty.