In our NSF RFE sponsored research project, we have been investigating the intersection of three goals in engineering education: professional formation of students, an integrated sociotechnical perception of engineering, and increased diversity and inclusion. We approached this investigation into possible social change with design thinking. We engaged with faculty, staff, and students in a collaborative design process as part of a comparative study of two engineering departments – the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering (BME) – at Purdue University. Our project has been organized around the three phases of the design process (inspiration, ideation, and implementation), and embedded within the design process is a longitudinal, multiphase, mixed-methods study. During this third phase of the project, implementation, we have been both challenged and enabled by events and shifting conversations around the viral pandemic of disease and the widespread activism around racial injustice.
In this paper, we provide an overview of the larger project’s previous analyses of the surveys and interview data from faculty, staff, administrators, students, and alumni in both ECE and BME which we have conducted. These analyses will provide insight on the indirect and/or longer-term impact on the school’s cultures and on aspects that are more embedded in the schools and disciplines, as well as those that are more amenable to change. In addition, we describe how design processes and mindsets have and can be used to address complex issues in engineering education, and how this approach facilitated the working groups/committees that emerged in both BME and ECE as part of this project. We also describe the data we are collecting in the final year of the project to understand the impacts of this project, as well as the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and the attention to racial disparities on our research questions.
Memoria Matters is a PhD student in the School of Engineering Education at Purdue University. She is also pursuing a Master's degree at the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering for computer engineering, in which she obtained her BSE from the University of Pennsylvania. Her research interest is in increasing the diversity of engineering by improving the inclusivity of engineering higher education through teaching methods, policies, and culture change.
Andrew O. Brightman is Professor of Engineering Practice in the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering. His research background is in cellular biochemistry, tissue engineering, engineering ethics, and diversity, equity, and inclusion in engineering education. Professor Brightman is an inaugural Fellow of the Online Ethics Center for Engineering and Science and is developing a Community of Practice around Ethics Education in Biomedical Engineering to develop and disseminate best practices for ethics training for the field of Biomedical Engineering.
http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0058-7676
University of South Florida
[biography]
Patrice M. Buzzanell is Distinguished University Professor and immediate past Chair of the Department of Communication at the University of South Florida and Endowed Visiting Professor for the School of Media and Design at Shanghai Jiaotong University. Fellow and Past President of the International Communication Association (ICA), she also is a Distinguished Scholar for the National Communication Association (NCA), Past President of the Council of Communication Associations, and Past President and Wise Woman of the Organization for the Study of Communication, Language, and Gender. She has received career achievement awards from ICA, NCA, the Central States Communication Association, and Purdue University where she was a Distinguished University Professor in communication and engineering education (by courtesy) and Endowed Chair and Director of the Susan Bulkeley Butler Center for Leadership Excellence. Her primary research areas are organizational communication, career, work-life, resilience, feminist/gender, and design. Her grants have focused on ethics, institutional transformation, and diversity-equity-inclusion-belongingness in the professional formation of engineers.
http://orcid.org/0009-0003-1391-6800
Purdue University at West Lafayette (PWL) (COE)
[biography]
Carla B. Zoltowski is an associate professor of engineering practice in the Elmore Family School of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) and (by courtesy) the School of Engineering Education, and Director of the Vertically Integrated Projects (VIP) Program within the College of Engineering at Purdue. She holds a B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering and a Ph.D. in Engineering Education, all from Purdue. Dr. Zoltowski’s research interests include the professional formation of engineers, human-centered design, and engineering ethics.
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