Comparing different types of professional practitioner engagement in an Integrated Design Engineering degree

Abstract

Design engineering education needs to be close to industrial practice, since industry is the final destination of most graduates. For this reason, early engagement with 'real' practitioners can be beneficial to educational outcomes. Although much research has been done comparing the skills and approaches of engineering design students and professional practitioners little research to date has looked in detail how this engagement affects the educational process. In this study, we evaluate the impact professional practitioners had on the learning process and the delivery of learning outcomes for a number of units in a specific Integrated Design Engineering (IDE) course. We are reporting data collected by three data sources, feedback from the cohort via surveys of "Start, Stop, Continue" that run at the end of each unit; the official feedback survey of the university; and focus group feedback. Our key findings are that the students appreciate the real design context and passionate engagement the professional practitioner (PP) can offer, when immersed in the teaching process and setting the assignment, but also are critical of the negative effects the PP can have in terms of marking assessments or limiting the creative potential of open-ended projects.

COMPARING ACADEMICS AND PRACTITIONERS Q & A TUTORING IN THE ENGINEERING DESIGN STUDIO

“…The design tutorial pedagogy has recently become more common in engineering design education, but most publications focus on describing specific implementations (e.g., Tavakoli (2000), Thompson (2002), and Vrcelj and Attard (2007)). Little research to date has looked in detail at how the engagement of practitioners affects student learning (e.g., Georgilas et al (2019)). Practitioners may not be familiar with expectations of design courses, for example they may expect complete designs (Tocco and Mata, 2012).…”

Comparing Design Outcomes Achieved by Teams of Expert and Novice Designers Through Agent-Based Simulation

“…There are several components that affect the creative process such as individual cognitive abilities, personality characteristics and social factors. A study by Georgilas et al (2019) showed that professional practitioner has an impact on the learning process and the delivery from the novices (students), hence negatively affects the creative potential of open-ended projects. Another study showed that adding a professional to student teams did not increase creativity but had a major influence on the selected functions (Zeiler, 2013).…”