Newsletter of the
Australasian Association
for Engineering Education

August 2006

From the Editor

This month we have a bumper Newsletter leading off with the Awards plus the Conference update. Note extended deadlines for both.

Then there is News from our President, a proposed national design competition for first year students, the Bibliography project, the Peer Support Network, Books, Conferences, Websites and so on, with contributions from various authors.

Keep those contributions coming in!

Contents

Annual awards. 1

2006 Conference! 2

Women in Engineering Forum 3

From the President ….. 3

First Year Design Challenge 4

The Bibliography of Engineering Education Project 4

Peer Support Network for New Academics in Engineering 5

Conference highlights. 5

Upcoming conferences. 6

Books to read. 6

Some useful websites. 8

AJEE articles. 8

Continuing Professional Development 8

Job opportunities. 8

Future AAEE Conferences 9

Newsletter contributions 9

Annual awards

As educators, our primary function is to produce graduates who are well prepared to take their role as engineering professionals. In doing so, our teaching staff must be innovative, effective and highly committed to optimising their students’ outcomes. As we strive to encourage our students to aim for excellence, it is appropriate to also recognise those who facilitate that excellence. The AaeE Awards, judged by a panel of their peers, recognise in a tangible way the commitment and contribution of our excellent teachers.

The value of each Award for 2006 is $2000.

The four awards for 2006 are:

· Excellence in Teaching and Learning in Engineering Education

· Excellence in Curriculum Innovation in Engineering Education

· Excellence in Inclusive Practice in Engineering Education

· Excellence in a Curriculum Team Project in Engineering Education

Closing date for Applications/ Nominations extended to 27 August 2006

The awards will be presented at the 2006 conference dinner in Auckland.

The criteria for these awards are listed on the AaeE website below.

Please note that these criteria are a close match to the Carrick Institute Award criteria.

The application process has been simplified to encourage either self nomination or nomination of your colleagues. Details and application/ nomination forms are available on the AaeE website.

Any questions …?

Please contact Liz Godfrey [l.godfrey@auckland.ac.nz] or Yvonne Toft [y.toft@cqu.edu.au]

These awards are sponsored by AaeE (with the support of the Australian and NZ Councils of Deans) and Engineers Australia.

2006 Conference!

The 2006 AAEE conference at AUT University, Auckland, NZ is an excellent line up of over 90 papers, several workshops and two key panel sessions.

This year the theme is structured around Creativity, Challenge and Change.

Keynote speakers are:

· Professor Sheryl A. Sorby, Civil and Environmental Engineering at Michigan Technological University. Professor Sorby will talk about a major funding program for implementing and assessing engineering education in the USA. A workshop on this topic will also be a feature at the conference.

· Assistant Professor Sean P. Brophy, Engineering Education at Purdue University who will talk about technology supported learning environments and conceptual change.

· Professor Anette Kolmos, Engineering Education at Aarlborg University (currently awaiting confirmation).

Two key panels will be featured covering:

· Women in Engineering – “Has Gender gone off the agenda?” (see below)

· Industry and Engineering Education – a mutually beneficial partnership?

The following events will also be featured during the conference:

· “Bubbles and Berries” registration on Sunday afternoon

· Traditional Maori welcome and opening of the conference (Monday)

· Optional Dinner Cruise in the City of Sails (Monday)

· Optional lunch tours through a local Marae

· AAEE conference dinner and awards night (Tuesday)

· Deans Meeting (Wednesday).

Closing date for papers has been extended to 31 August 2006

Women in Engineering Forum

For several years, the Women in Engineering Forum has not had a profile at the annual AaeE conference.

Participation by females in engineering has certainly not continued to rise, and has plateaued or fallen in many universities.

It seems timely therefore to  debate:

Has Gender gone off the Agenda?

At the December 06 AaeE conference to be held in Auckland, a discussion led by a panel of:

Professor Elizabeth Taylor	Central Queensland University
Gunilla Burrowes	University of Newcastle Past President, Newcastle Division, Engineers Australia
Dr Elizabeth Godfrey	Assoc Dean Undergraduate, University of Auckland

will lead a plenary session on Tuesday 12 December.

We look forward to your input before and at the conference.

Enquiries, input, or contributions to:

Liz Godfrey

AaeE2006 Conference Committee

L.Godfrey@auckland.ac.nz

From the President …

The members of the Executive Committee have been busy over the last couple of months on a number of AaeE projects, including a two-day meeting of the Executive Committee in Brisbane at the end of May. During this time substantial progress was made on a number of AaeE projects, and others were completed:

· The 2006 Conference Organising Committee, Chaired by Darius Singh, is in the process of gathering full papers and registration information is on the Conference website.

· Liz Godfrey and Yvonne Toft have finalised the brochure for this years Excellence Awards and members should have already received a copy, with applications hopefully well advanced.

· Holger Maier has employed a postgraduate student to work on the Bibliography project, and would still welcome input from members about their key engineering education references.

· Gunilla Burrowes and the members of the editorial committee have been considering options for the Journal and the Executive endorsed their recommendation that the Journal should continue to be an online publication for the foreseeable future.

· David Radcliffe tabled the final report from the 2005 Conference Organising Committee. The profit from this highly successful Conference was distributed between AaeE, Young Engineers and Engineers Australia.

Further details of these projects will be published elsewhere in due course.

On your behalf I attended the Joint Chairs meeting which was held on the 19^th of May in Sydney. This is a meeting of all of the Chairs of Engineers Australia’s Colleges and Societies, and AaeE is one of those Societies. It was a valuable meeting and I took the opportunity to encourage the other groups to establish links with AaeE that would enable us to work together to advance engineering education.

David Dowling

Campus representatives

The Executive Committee has decided to appoint an AaeE representative at each university or institution to promote the Association and distribute flyers about conferences etc. We would like to hear from members at the following universities who would like to be an AaeE representative: UWS, Wollongong, VU, Swinburne, Murdoch, Griffith, ANU and Latrobe. Please contact David Dowling by email if you are interested. dowling@usq.edu.au

First Year Design Challenge

Engineering a Better World – First-Year Design Challenge

… A national design competition for first-year engineering students, aimed at developing their experiences and key attributes through team-based design on inspirational sustainable development projects.

Why sustainable development?

Engineers Without Borders' (EWB) mission of working with disadvantaged communities to improve their quality of life through education and the implementation of sustainable development projects is one that resonates with aspiring young engineers. This is evidenced by EWB membership swelling to 1800 in just over three years, with the majority being university students or young engineers in the first few years of their professional careers.

Having a first-year design competition focused on sustainable development will ensure students are inspired and actively engaged, producing more effective educational outcomes.

Capitalising on EWB's strengths

EWB's nationwide network of passionate and dedicated volunteers (18 chapters across all States and Territories) can be drawn upon to effectively and efficiently set up and run the first-year design competition.

Also, the competition design brief may be based on an actual sustainable development project from EWB's growing list of past and present projects. Some examples include: water supply and quality, sanitation, waste water management, solid waste management, energy needs, flood mitigation, and infrastructure development.

More information

The design competition is in the final stages of development, with a formal announcement to be made at the AaeE conference in Auckland in December.

Prof. Frank Bullen, Dean of Engineering, UTas.

The Bibliography of Engineering Education Project

A new initiative from AaeE aims to develop a working bibliography for educators extending their practice in engineering education through engagement with 'new-to-them' concepts and ideas. At this stage, the project aims to identify key, introductory material across a range of broad domains. Ideally, these references would provide educators with exposure to key aspects of pedagogy and/or their application within engineering education.

We invite you to provide us with your best 'picks' in the following areas:

· The journey: from engineering expert to engineering education expert; scholarship in learning and teaching, education theory, reflective practice, writing 'teaching philosophy' portfolio materials

· Assessment: self, peer, group, attributes

· Learning: styles, adult learning theory

· Teaching Methodologies: pbl, groupwork, roleplay, 1st year, design, lecturing to large classes

· Diversity: gender, inclusivity, international/globalisation, culture

· Curriculum design: pbl, attributes, integrated curriculum, professional development/practice; flexible curriculum design

· Multidisciplinary: sustainability, workplace learning, ethics

Send your references and links to documents to: Holger Maier (hmaier@civeng.adelaide.edu.au)

Peer Support Network for New Academics in Engineering

The start of an academic career can be particularly difficult. Regardless of whether it's a shift from industry to academia, or the move from postgrad to lecturer, there are a wide range of challenges that have to be encountered for the first time. To help with this transition, AAEE runs a Peer Support Network for New Academics. It is an opportunity for new (and not so new) academic staff to share their experiences with each other, and to help tackle the issues that are relevant for new academics today, in the Australasian context.

Somewhere in your Faculty there is a new academic: someone who has only just joined up this semester. Please help us help them by directing them to http://www.aaee.com.au/networks/psn/ so they can see all of the goodies we have to offer. This month's Guru of the Month is Gerard Rowe, the winner of the 2005 AAEE award for excellence in Engineering Education in the Teaching and Learning category.

Want more information? Contact the organiser, Euan Lindsay – e.lindsay@curtin.edu.au

Call for Chapters

… for the “Handbook of Research on Learning Design and Learning Objects: Issues, Applications and Technologies”. 

This handbook, edited by us, is scheduled to be published by IDEA Group in early 2008.

If you are currently researching in the area of learning designs and/or learning objects, we hope you will be interested in writing a chapter. 

Chapter proposals are due 30 September 2006 and full chapters are due 31 January 2007.

More information is at http://edserver2.uow.edu.au/~llockyer/handbook.htm.

Conference highlights

First Year in Higher Education, Gold Coast, July 2006

This conference series is organised by QUT and was held this year at Griffith University on the Gold Coast (http://www.fyhe.qut.edu.au/index.html). Past papers from this series are available at: http://www.fyhe.qut.edu.au/past_papers.html from 1998 onwards.

Some highlights for me were:

Generation Y (our current students):

· Short attention span: Instant gratification

· Working more

· Technically sophisticated (most)

· Less convinced of value of higher education

· Rights driven (as customers)

· 35% in HE are drifters/churners/parkers – waiting for a better offer

· Material things = success

· Know they are customers

· Concerned with self image

· Entrepreneurial

· Less theory, more relevance

· Play precursor to action

· Quick decision makers (non-cognitive)

· Like to be entertained

· Often lack resilience – give up when it gets tough

Student Engagement

From John Dearn at UC: “To teach is to engage students in learning” – Christensen

So, what is engagement? (students and staff)

· Commitment (reciprocal)

· Interested and involved

· Takes time

· Willing to change (and learn)

· Want to be productive

· Ask questions

· Getting to know you

· Understand each other

· Passionate

Levels of engagement:

· Self

· The courses and program

· Other students, friends, peers, etc

· Staff + the University

· The Profession – becoming an engineer

· Society – the role of engineering

· World (the environment; sustainability)

With so many levels with which students need to be engaged, is it any wonder this task is so difficult, complex and confusing?

Roger Hadgraft, T&L Director, Civil, Enviro & Chem Engineering, RMIT.

ASEE and other relevant international conferences, plus full access to papers

http://asee.org/about/events/conferences/

Upcoming conferences

ASEE Annual Conference in June 2007

http://www.asee.org/about/events/conferences/annual/2006/index.cfm

5th Global Colloquium on Engineering Education

Quoted from: http://asee.org/about/events/conferences/international/2006/index.cfm

5^th Annual ASEE Global Colloquium on Engineering Education

“Engineering Education in the Americas and Beyond”

October 9 – 12, 2006

Le Meridien Hotel

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

IGIP Symposium

On behalf of the Organizing Committee we extend a warm invitation to you to participate in 35^th International IGIP Symposium that will be held in Tallinn, Estonia, September 18-21, 2006.

The motto of the Symposium "Engineering Education - Priority for Global Development" refers to the significant role of engineering education in overall development.  Discussions will be held on international aspects and experiences of engineering education on a global scale. The Symposium will concentrate on establishing common milestones for engineering education for the future, on the progress of engineering pedagogy, and its experiences in teaching technical subjects. The symposium will also discuss future developments in engineering education due to the Bologna declaration.

David Radcliffe is a Keynote Speaker at the Symposium.

More detailed information can be found from http://www.igip.ee or from http://www.igip.info

Books to read

Engineering Engineers for the 21^st Century (Royal Academy of Engineering)

The Royal Academy of Engineering in the UK conducted a study of the engineering education requirements in terms of the current and future needs of engineering industry – the so called Henley Report. They found that the pace of change in industry is expected to intensify in both the technological and non-technological domains. They conclude that the top priorities in terms of future skills will be practical application, theoretical understanding, and creativity and innovation. It is suggested that there be more business oriented project work and significant work experience before graduation and that this will require closer university-industry ties. Three roles for the engineer of the future are identified; (i) the technical specialist, (ii) the engineering integrator and (iii) the engineer as change agent.

http://www.raeng.org.uk/news/releases/henley/default.htm

Rising Above the Gathering Storm (National Academies of the USA)

The report of the National Academies, Rising above the Gathering Storm highlights the urgency of the problem facing the US if it is to retain its preeminent technological position in the world economy and thus maintain its standard of living. The report makes four sets of recommendations concerning K-12 education, technology research funding, participation patterns in higher education and economic policy around incentives for innovation. The recommendations on schooling focus on recruiting and preparing many more teachers – 10,000 teachers to educate 10 million minds – an unprecedented challenge to the policy makers. The aim is to enlarge the talent pool entering university programs in science, engineering and mathematics.

http://newton.nap.edu/execsumm_pdf/11463

ATSE Focus on Eng Educ.

See the recent issue of ATSE Focus on Eng Educ.  Vol 141 June 2006

http://www.atse.org.au/index.php?sectionid=742

Some very interesting articles. You can download the whole issue at: http://www.atse.org.au/uploads/ATSE%20Focus%20June%2006%20141.pdf

David Radcliffe, Thiess Professor of Engineering Education and Professional Development, UQ.

Why all teachers (and students) should read:
"The Art of Changing the Brain" by James Zull

This is an easy to read book that links together brain research and educational theory. The two most important things that I learned were:

1. Kolb's learning cycle (concrete experience then reflective observation then abstract conceptualisation then active experimentation) is a close description of how the brain really works. Brain scans show that the brain works through four steps: sensing (collecting data), basic conceptualisation (recognising simple objects), advanced conceptualisation (dealing with abstraction) and, finally, action (speaking, moving, etc). So, Kolb's model is supported by brain research, which means we should pay more attention to it. How many of your teaching/learning sessions begin with concrete experience, or do you go to the theory first? (Remember that theory is still just a theory, not reality).

2. We learn by hard-wiring our brains. That is, we've learned something (as opposed to remembered something temporarily) when the brain has a dedicated neural circuit to reproduce it). Once that's in place, we really don't need to "think" about it anymore. Consider, walking, driving, playing your favourite sport or musical instrument. How much thinking do you do? Likewise, well developed professional skills are virtually unconscious - tacit knowledge. The downside is that this type of deep learning is very slow. Think about how long it takes to learn to drive, play a musical instrument, do ballet, play sport at a competitive level. Yet, we think our students can reach our level of performance in 12-13 weeks! Then, we fail them if they're a bit too slow.

So, how should we change our teaching? First, rely much more on concrete experience and use it to drive and reinforce "theory" rather than the other way around. After all, in the real world, problems present to our graduates as concrete experiences, not as theories in books. They need the ability to move from problem to possible solutions, perhaps inventing new ones for themselves.

Second, have patience and emphasise the need for practice. We should make it possible to retake exams when students are ready rather than just once or sometimes twice a year.

And remember that students also need to play the game, not just practise the strokes. (Imagine how tennis would be taught at university. You'd only get to play the game in your Honours year :-).

There are, of course, many other interesting ideas in this book, which you'll have to read for yourself.

Zull, James E., The art of changing the brain : enriching teaching by exploring the biology of learning , 1st ed., Sterling, Va.: Stylus Pub., 2002.

Roger Hadgraft, T&L Director, Civil, Enviro & Chem Engineering, RMIT.

Some useful websites

UTS Groupwork Resources

I recently learned about UTS’s T&L site at: http://www.iml.uts.edu.au/learnteach/groupwork/resources.html. This page includes some great exercises to kick start group work:

· Getting to know you

· Group charter

· Team Review (strengths and weaknesses)

· Team meeting summary

These Groupwork resources are part of a much larger T&L site, which you can explore at your leisure.

Higher Education Academy, UK

· Engineering Subject Centre, Resources

Richard Felder’s Random Thoughts (from Chem Eng Educ)

· http://www2.ncsu.edu/unity/lockers/users/f/felder/public/Columns.html

EdNA – Education Network Australia, Higher Education

· http://www.edna.edu.au/edna/go/pid/416

International Journals in Engineering Education

· Chemical Engineering Education

· Journal of Engineering Education (ASEE)

· European Journal of Engineering Education (SEFI)

· International Journal of Engineering Education

Carrick Institute

· See http://www.carrickinstitute.edu.au/carrick/go for more information. The Australian Awards for University Teaching are now available.

Other EE and HE organisations

· See the AAEE Links page.

AJEE articles

New plans are being developed for the revitalisation of the Journal. Stay tuned for more information.

Continuing Professional Development

This is a space for program coordinators to describe new and interesting programs to AAEE members. Send details to the editor.

Job opportunities

Coming to the website will be an area for jobs to be posted and browsed. So, if you are advertising an academic position post it here: www.aaee.com.au/members-only/jobs

Future AAEE Conferences

2008 and beyond

Expressions of interest are invited for hosting the 2008 (and beyond) conferences, preferably by September 2006. A copy of the guidelines for prospective hosts may be obtained from Wageeh Boles at QUT, w.boles@qut.edu.au.

Newsletter contributions

Share your good ideas, conference announcements, book titles, great websites, etc with other members. Send them to Roger.Hadgraft@RMIT.edu.au for inclusion in the next Newsletter.

Newsletter of the Australasian Association for Engineering Education, http://www.aaee.com.au, Aug 2006.