Purpose: This paper aims to discuss the challenge for the classical idea of professionalism in understanding the Chinese software engineering industry after giving a close insight into the development of this industry as well as individual engineers with a psycho-societal perspective. Design/methodology/approach: The study starts with the general…

Any librarian who has managed electronic resources has experienced the--for want of words--"joy" of gathering and analyzing usage statistics. Such statistics are important for evaluating the effectiveness of resources and for making important budgeting decisions. Unfortunately, the data are usually tedious to collect, inconsistently organized, of…

Among the National Science Foundation's (NSF) postdoctoral programs, the International Research Fellowship Program (IRFP) is unique in its emphasis on providing postdoctoral fellows with international research experiences. Established in 1992, IRFP provides financial support to postdoctoral scientists for a research experience abroad lasting from…

The purpose of this research is to study general student perceptions of online education and characterize the differences that exist between various student demographic groups, with a focus on differences between those who have and have not previously taken courses online. We surveyed more than 300 students and analyzed their responses. Although…

Although several learning theories ranging from behaviourism to cognitive to humanism have been proposed to choose the appropriate effective teaching models, none can be applied across the broad to all learners in all situations, nevertheless some commonalities emerge. A combination of pedagogical and andragogical, "middle of the road"…

Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) have unique characteristics which constrain them; including small energy stores, limited computation, and short range communication capability. Most traditional security algorithms use cryptographic primitives such as Public-key cryptography and are not optimized for energy usage. Employing these algorithms for the…

We examine the pedagogical suitability of introducing a teaching sequence for the concept of electrical capacitance within the context of charging a body. This short sequence targets first year university students and was designed following students' common conceptions on this topic. The evaluation is made by comparing the results with a control…

A number of leaders in technology education have indicated that a major difference between the technological design process and the engineering design process is analysis and optimization. The analysis stage of the engineering design process is when mathematical models and scientific principles are employed to help the designer predict design…

This study evaluated metacognitive changes of three groups of 160 engineering students working on 60 different design projects. Two metacognitive features, cognitive self-appraisal and cognitive self-management, were used to indicate students' metacognitive level. The Engineering Design Project Inventory was used to assess students' metacognition.…

Taking part in the United States Department of Energy's Real World Design Challenge (RWDC), the author describes how four technology education students at Cumberland Valley High School in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania, took on the challenge to redesign an aircraft wing, attempting to make it more efficient than one currently in operation. The…

A small commercial building in a nearby industrial park has decided to install a rooftop garden for its employees to enjoy. The garden will be about 100 feet long and 75 feet wide. This article presents a design challenge for technology and engineering students wherein they will assist in the initial conceptual design of the rooftop garden. The…

Solid modeling is widely used as a teaching tool in summer activities with high school students. The addition of motion analysis allows concepts from statics and dynamics to be introduced to students in both qualitative and quantitative ways. Two sets of solid modeling projects--carnival rides and Rube Goldberg machines--are shown to allow the…

This paper documents several years of experimentation with a new approach to organizing and managing projects in a software engineering course. The initial failure and subsequent refinements that the new approach has been through since 2004 are described herein. The "constrained and guided" approach, as it is called, has helped to reduce…

In a diagnostic problem solving operation of a computer-simulated chemical plant, chemical engineering students were randomly assigned to two groups: one studying product-oriented worked examples, the other practicing conventional problem solving. Effects of these instructional strategies on the progression of learners' mental models were examined…

An experiment is described that illustrates how chemical engineering correlations are created. Balls of different diameters and different specific gravities (all less than one) are dropped from several heights into a pool of water, and the maximum depth reached by the ball is measured. This data is used to estimate the coefficients for a…