Measuring the Impact of a New Mechanical Engineering Sophomore Design Course on Students’ Systems Thinking Skills

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cassandra M. Degen ◽  
Karim H. Muci-Küchler ◽  
Mark D. Bedillion ◽  
Shaobo Huang ◽  
Marius Ellingsen
Keyword(s):  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Mechanical Engineering ◽  
Thinking Skills ◽  
Target Product ◽  
Concept Generation ◽  
Systems Architecture ◽  
Customer Needs ◽  
Survey Results ◽  
Product Specifications

As the complexity of cutting edge products increases with advances in technology, there is a need to include activities in the undergraduate curriculum that allow students to learn basic systems engineering concepts, that promote the development of their systems thinking skills, and that allow them to practice these skills. To this end, the aim of this work was to impact students’ systems thinking skills at an early stage of their mechanical engineering curriculum, develop assessment tools to measure sophomore-level mechanical engineering students’ system thinking skills, and observe trends in measured systems thinking skills both before and after exposure to a new sophomore design course. This paper provides an overview of the new course, gives details about an Engineering Systems Thinking Survey (ESTS) that was developed to assess systems thinking skills in specific areas, and presents the results of the ESTS from implementation of the course during two separate semesters. The specific areas that were targeted were identification of customer needs, setting target product specifications, concept generation, and systems architecture. The survey results showed that the course was successful in improving students’ self-efficacy on each of the four topics, particularly in setting target specifications and systems architecture. In addition, comparisons of pre- and post-ESTS results showed improvements in student answers on the technical questions related to identification of customer needs, setting target product specifications, and concept generation, with a slight decrease in the area of systems architecture. While the newly developed course was successful in the dissemination of fundamental systems thinking and systems engineering concepts among students, the survey results indicated the need to strengthen students’ awareness of concept implementation. Future work will explore how to improve the course activities to help students learn how to apply the concepts, particularly for the topics of setting target specifications and systems architecture.

Using Practical Examples to Motivate the Study of Product Development and Systems Engineering Topics

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Ziadat ◽  
Marius D. Ellingsen ◽  
Karim H. Muci-Küchler ◽  
Shaobo Huang ◽  
Cassandra M. Degen
Keyword(s):  
Product Development ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Solution Space ◽  
Entire Solution ◽  
Concept Generation ◽  
Design Work ◽  
Systems Architecture ◽  
Customer Needs ◽  
The Right

Most undergraduate mechanical engineering curricula contain one or more courses that provide an introduction to the product design and development process. These courses include some topics that, without the proper motivation, may be perceived by students as being of low relevance. In addition, they also cover topics that may seem to be somewhat abstract and difficult to apply unless they are preceded by examples that clearly illustrate their practical value. The tasks of identifying customer needs and setting target specifications are typical examples of the first scenario described above. In general, engineering students have the notion that the activities of the detailed design phase are the ones that really matter and that those activities are the ones that determine the ultimate success of a product. They are so concerned with designing the physical components of the product correctly that they spend little time and effort in other steps that are necessary to make sure that they are designing the right product. The tasks of concept generation and defining the architecture of a product are good examples of the second scenario mentioned in the first paragraph. Most students quickly proceed to pick a concept that they think is viable without carefully exploring the entire solution space. In addition, when considering relatively complex products, many students don’t spend enough time considering aspects such as defining the interfaces between different components. As a result, student teams end up with a collection of components that are individually well-designed but integrate poorly, and the end product suffers accordingly. Short, introductory examples demonstrating the importance of tasks like the ones mentioned above were created in order to get the attention of students and spark their interest in learning about such topics. These presentations were also created with the intent that they would motivate students to apply what they had learned when designing their own product or system. Through the examples, which corresponded to real-world product development efforts, students were exposed to not just well-designed and well-made products or systems that turned out to be successful, but also to products or systems that failed in the marketplace or experienced significant problems because the designers failed to adequately perform a task such as identifying customer requirements. The latter clearly showcased the importance of such tasks and conveyed the fact that good technical design work can be rendered moot by failing to put the required effort into the early stages of the development of a product or system. This paper presents the general criteria used and the approach followed to select and develop short introductory examples for the topics of identifying customer needs, setting target specifications, concept generation, and systems architecture. It briefly describes the examples selected and presents the results of a pilot assessment that was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of one of those examples.

Incorporating Basic Systems Thinking and Systems Engineering Concepts in a Sophomore-Level Product Design and Development Course

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karim H. Muci-Küchler ◽  
Mark D. Bedillion ◽  
Cassandra M. Degen ◽  
Marius D. Ellingsen ◽  
Shaobo Huang
Keyword(s):  
Product Development ◽  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Mechanical Engineering ◽  
Undergraduate Curriculum ◽  
Low Complexity ◽  
Thinking Skills ◽  
Design And Development ◽  
Engineering Programs ◽  
Development Course

Although many US undergraduate mechanical engineering programs formally expose students to the basic concepts, methodologies, and tools used for the design and development of new products, the scope is usually limited to products of low complexity. There is a need to include activities in the undergraduate curriculum that allow students to learn basic systems engineering concepts, that promote the development of their systems thinking skills, and that allow them to practice these skills. This paper describes an initial effort at integrating systems engineering concepts in the curriculum focusing on a sophomore-level product development course. The paper discusses the approach that was used to identify topics related to systems thinking and systems engineering, provides the list of topics that were selected, and outlines the approach that will be used to incorporate those topics in the course. In addition, it provides the results of a pilot self-efficacy survey focusing on some of the topics selected that was delivered to junior students who had already taken a formal product development course. Although a specific course was considered, the same approach could be used in the context of the entire mechanical engineering undergraduate curriculum. Also, the results presented in the paper could be easily adapted to similar courses at other institutions.

scholarly journals Incorporating Basic Systems Thinking and Systems Engineering Concepts in a Mechanical Engineering Sophomore Design Course

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karim Muci-Kuchler ◽  
Mark Bedillion ◽  
Shaobo Huang ◽  
Cassandra Degen ◽  
Marius Ellingsen ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Mechanical Engineering

scholarly journals Incorporating Systems Thinking and Systems Engineering Concepts in a Freshman-Level Mechanical Engineering Course

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karim Muci-Kuchler ◽  
Cassandra Birrenkott ◽  
Mark Bedillion ◽  
Marsha Lovett ◽  
Clifford Whitcomb
Keyword(s):  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Systems Engineering ◽  
Mechanical Engineering

scholarly journals Extending Systems Thinking Skills to an Introductory Mechanical Engineering Course

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karim Muci-Kuchler ◽  
Cassandra Degen ◽  
Mark Bedillion ◽  
Marsha Lovett
Keyword(s):  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Mechanical Engineering ◽  
Thinking Skills

scholarly journals Beyond the Central Dogma: Model-Based Learning of How Genes Determine Phenotypes

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. ar4 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Reinagel ◽  
Elena Bray Speth
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Molecular Genetics ◽  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Protein Function ◽  
Model Building ◽  
Thinking Skills ◽  
Skills Acquisition ◽  
Model Based ◽  
Scaffolded Instruction ◽  
Introductory Biology Course

In an introductory biology course, we implemented a learner-centered, model-based pedagogy that frequently engaged students in building conceptual models to explain how genes determine phenotypes. Model-building tasks were incorporated within case studies and aimed at eliciting students’ understanding of 1) the origin of variation in a population and 2) how genes/alleles determine phenotypes. Guided by theory on hierarchical development of systems-thinking skills, we scaffolded instruction and assessment so that students would first focus on articulating isolated relationships between pairs of molecular genetics structures and then integrate these relationships into an explanatory network. We analyzed models students generated on two exams to assess whether students’ learning of molecular genetics progressed along the theoretical hierarchical sequence of systems-thinking skills acquisition. With repeated practice, peer discussion, and instructor feedback over the course of the semester, students’ models became more accurate, better contextualized, and more meaningful. At the end of the semester, however, more than 25% of students still struggled to describe phenotype as an output of protein function. We therefore recommend that 1) practices like modeling, which require connecting genes to phenotypes; and 2) well-developed case studies highlighting proteins and their functions, take center stage in molecular genetics instruction.

scholarly journals Enhancement and assessment of students’ systems thinking skills by application of systemic synthesis questions in the organic chemistry course

2016 ◽  
Vol 81 (12) ◽  
pp. 1455-1471 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tamara Hrin ◽  
Dusica Milenkovic ◽  
Mirjana Segedinac ◽  
Sasa Horvat
Keyword(s):  
Organic Chemistry ◽  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Higher Order Thinking ◽  
Thinking Skills ◽  
Assessment Tools ◽  
School Students ◽  
Complex Dimension ◽  
Complex Process ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Teaching Learning

Many studies in the field of science education have emphasized the fact that systems thinking is a very important higher-order thinking skill which should be fostered during classes. However, more attention has been dedicated to the different ways of systems thinking skills assessment, and less to their enhancement. Taking this into consideration, the goal of our study was not only to validate secondary school students? systems thinking skills, but also to help students in the complex process of their development. With this goal, new instructional and assessment tools - systemic synthesis questions [SSynQs], were constructed, and an experiment with one experimental (E) and one control (C) group was conducted during organic chemistry classes. Namely, the instructional teaching/learning method for both E and C groups was the same in processing the new contents, but different on classes for the revision of the selected organic chemistry contents. The results showed that students exposed to the new instructional method (E group) achieved higher performance scores on three different types of systems thinking than students from the C group, who were taught by the traditional method. The greatest difference between the groups was found in the most complex dimension of systems thinking construct - in the II level of procedural systems thinking. Along with this dimension, structural systems thinking and I level of procedural systems thinking were also observed.

Transformational spaces: educators discuss map the system and supporting Canada’s emerging generation of systems thinkers

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Katharine McGowan ◽  
Latasha Calf Robe ◽  
Laura Allan ◽  
Elinor Flora Bray-Collins ◽  
Mathieu Couture ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Systems Thinking ◽  
Social Innovation ◽  
Collaborative Work ◽  
Thinking Skills ◽  
Third Mission ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Post Secondary ◽  
Internal Work ◽  
Treat All ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to explore multiple Canadian educators' experiences with the Map the System (MTS) competition, designed to foster and grow systems thinking capacity among students exploring complex questions. The challenge has been an opportunity for social innovation programs (from the nascent to the established) across Canadian post-secondaries to engage both with their own communities and with social innovators internationally, connecting social innovation spaces as part of their third mission. Across the organizations, students valued the interdisciplinary and systems thinking qualities, and organizations benefited from the external competition, there remain questions about organizational engagement in social innovation as a deeply transformative process internally. Design/methodology/approach All Canadian post-secondary institutions who participated in the 2020 MTS competition (17) were invited to a digital roundtable to discuss their experiences. Ten were able to participate, representing a range of post-secondaries (including large research institutions, undergraduate-only universities and colleges). To facilitate discussion, participants met to discuss format and topics; for the roundtable itself, participant educators used a google form to capture their experiences. These were summarized, anonymized and redistributed for validation and clarification. To reflect this collaborative approach, all participant educators are listed as authors on this paper, alphabetically after the organizing authors. Findings For students participating in MTS, they have built both their interdisciplinary and systems thinking skills, as well as their commitment to achieving meaningful change in their community. But MTS arrived in fertile environments and acted as an accelerant, driving attention, validation and connection. Yet while this might align with post-secondary education’s third mission, educators expressed concerns about sustainability, internal commitment to change and navigating tensions between a challenge approach and collaborative work, and internal work and national competition limitations. This complicates the simple insertion of MTS in a post-secondary’s social innovation-related third mission. Research limitations/implications This study was limited to Canadian post-secondaries participating in MTS, and therefore are not representative of either post-secondaries in Canada, or all the MTS participants although Canada is well represented in the challenge itself. Additionally, while the authors believe their approach to treat all participants as authors, and ensured multiple feedback opportunities in private and collectively, this is a deliberate and potentially controversial move away from a traditional study. Social implications More than half of Canadian universities (a subgroup of post-secondaries) had at least one social innovation initiative, but questions have been raised about whether these initiatives are being evaluated internally, or are triggering the kinds of transformative internal work that might be an outcome. Understanding the impact of MTS one example of a social innovation-related initiative can help advance the broader conversation about the place (s) for social innovation in the post-secondary landscape – and where there is still significant work to be done. Originality/value As Canada has only participated in MTS for four years, this is the first inter-institution consideration of its related opportunities and obstacles as a vehicle for transformational social innovation. As well, educators talking openly and frankly to educators reinforces the collaborative quality of social innovation across the post-secondary landscape.

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