Student perceptions on a collaborative engineering design course

Student perceptions on a collaborative engineering design course

van Helden, G. (TU Delft Space Systems Egineering)
Zandbergen, B.T.C. (TU Delft Space Systems Egineering)
Specht, M.M. (TU Delft Web Information Systems)
Gill, E.K.A. (TU Delft Space Systems Egineering)

Jarvinen, Hannu-Matti (editor)
Silvestre, Santiago (editor)
Llorens, Ariadna (editor)
Nagy, Balazs Vince (editor)

2022

To adequately prepare engineering students for their professional career, educational institutions offer projects in which students collaboratively solve engineering design problems. It is known from research these projects can lead to a variety of learning outcomes and student experiences. However, studies that provide insights in the influence of different features of an educational design are rare. In the current study we use Cultural Historical Activity Theory (CHAT) as analytical framework to understand how different elements of an educational design affect students’ experience. Additionally, we use the notion of contradictions to identify opportunities for structural course improvement. Focus groups were conducted with 12 Master students in Aerospace Engineering, that participated in a collaborative engineering design course. During the course, students applied Systems Engineering (SE) and Concurrent Engineering (CE) and worked in the Collaborative Design Laboratory (CDL), which is a state-of-the-art facility that holds a variety of industry relevant tools. It was found that students valued the guidance of their coach and experts, co-located collaboration and the freedom to structure their own process. However, they perceived challenges with regard to adoption of tools in the CDL, sharing their progress with their supervisor, coordination of collaborative efforts and scheduling issues. An analysis using CHAT revealed what contradictions caused these challenges. Finally, recommendations are given on how course structure can be structurally improved.

focus groups
course design
team based learning
project based learning
learning technology

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:2c10e3f8-9833-4462-bc07-ebbb454c523e

https://doi.org/10.5821/conference-9788412322262.1323

978-84-123222-6-2

Proceedings of the 50th Annual Conference Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech (UPC)

50th Annual Conference of The European Society for Engineering Education, 2022-09-19 → 2022-09-22, Barcelona, Spain

SEFI 2022 - 50th Annual Conference of the European Society for Engineering Education, Proceedings

Institutional Repository

conference paper

© 2022 G. van Helden, B.T.C. Zandbergen, M.M. Specht, E.K.A. Gill