Engineering Students’ Challenging Learning Experiences and their Changing Attitude towards Academic Performance

Abstract

This study determined the challenging learning experiences of engineering students while completing their degree program as factor that might influence to their changing attitude towards achieving higher academic performance. Mixed method of research was utilised in the study considering the total population of 75 graduating students for quantitative and 12 students for qualitative part of the study using focus group discussion. Results showed that engineering students have significantly higher level of positive attitude towards academic performance during their junior level but significantly lower after taking professional courses. Attaining high academic performance still really matters for the engineering students during their junior level but continuously changing their perspective due to encountered challenging experiences while taking the professional courses. Performance in General Engineering courses describes the attitude of the students towards academic performance in personal aspect while professional courses define their attitude in professional aspect. The finding of the qualitative research revealed that there are three themes emerged in the challenging experiences of the engineering students and these are: Abandoned Social Freedom, Survival of the Fittest and Future Oriented Mindset which contributed to the changing perspectives of the engineering students.

College Satisfaction, Sense of Achievement, Student Happiness and Sense of Belonging of Freshmen in Chinese Private Colleges: Mediation Effect of Emotion Regulation

“…Learning experience, including learners' beliefs and experiences about the learning context, is a clear indicator of students' academic performance and affects their sense of belonging [23]. Therefore, understanding the key factors affecting students' sense of belonging, their learning experience, as well as how these factors are linked is necessary to develop students' positive sense of belonging.…”

Factors Affecting Freshman Engineering Students’ Attitudes Toward Mathematics

“…The researchers concluded that Tanzanian students had positive attitudes towards mathematics, and the reasons for these attitudes were: (1) feeling joy when learning mathematics, (2) academic competence of the student, (3) teaching methods, (4) classroom educational environment, (5) availability of scientific means in the school, and (6) tests results. Several studies indicate the influence of other factors such as colleagues and friends (He, 2007;Yang, 2013), family and parents (Davadas & Lay, 2020), school (Laguador & Dotong, 2020;Yang, 2013), teachers' personal characteristics (Al Shabibi, Al Mantheri, & Al Rashdi, 2019;Blazar & Kraft, 2017;Sakiz, Pape, & Hoy, 2012), teachers' knowledge of content (Simmers, 2011), language (Mazana, Montero, & Casmir, 2019), and how mathematics relates to daily life (Yılmaz, Altun, & Olkun, 2010).…”