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The Research Question:

Do graduate students who engage as co-creators of interdisciplinary educational modules with faculty and industry experts improve their communication, teamwork skills and interest in research?

Mission

  • Create opportunities for students to work with an interdisciplinary team of faculty and industry professionals and learn about the variety of problems that engineering students can investigate.
  • Support a culture wherein students can explore research topics aligned with their backgrounds, experiences and interests. 
  • Increase the participation of traditionally underrepresented students in graduate engineering research.

Theme : Cyber-Physical Systems and Life-Cycle Management and Assessment

The project will be piloted considering the topics of Cyber-Physical Systems (CPS) and Product Lifecycle Management (PLM). CPS are physical systems that are embedded with sensors and connected via a communication network to  computing systems that monitor, make data-driven decisions and control the physical system. PLM and life-cycle assessment (LCA) are becoming important practices in manufacturing and service industries with increasing availability of data across the lifecycle of the product or system. CPS and PLM together pose interesting and challenging problems across the science, engineering and humanities disciplines in a wide variety of applications. 

The Team

Researchers from engineering, psychology sociology and business at:

University of Massachusetts Lowell

University of Massachusetts Dartmouth

University of the District of Columbia

North Carolina A&T State University

Project Overview

  • There are two phases in this research. The first phase that takes place over a semester includes training graduate students in the co-creation process. Several workshops on writing, interdisciplinary collaboration, asking the right questions, inclusive teamwork are offered periodically. At the same time topics on CPS and PLM are being explored by two student teams using a project-based learning framework. Students are connected to industry professionals and given guidance on interview techniques. This phase culminates with each group completing and submitting for review a  conference proceedings or journal paper. The research is also to be mapped to an online educational module. 
  • In the second phase, the online modules are integrated as special topics in an undergraduate or first year graduate course at each of the four collaborating institutions. These modules are written primarily by the graduate students and are designed to be accessible to students who may not have a background in CPS or PLM. 
  • Each phase includes  assessment by an independent evaluator using qualitative data generated from focus groups and quantitative data from surveys and questionnaires. 

Kavitha Chandra

Associate Dean Undergraduate Programs and Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering

University of Massachusetts Lowell

Susan Tripathy

Associate Teaching Professor of Sociology

University of Massachusetts Lowell

Charles Thompson

Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering

University of Massachusetts Lowell

Tzuyang Yu

Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering

University of Massachusetts Lowell

Jennifer Percival

Dean, Schmidthorst College of Business, Bowling Green State University

Formerly Associate Dean at the Manning School of Business, University of Massachusetts Lowell

Trina Kershaw

Professor of Psychology

University of Massachusetts Dartmouth

Hong Liu

Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering

University of Massachusetts Dartmouth

Max Denis

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering

University of the District of Columbia

Ioannis Raptis

Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering

North Carolina A&T State University

Seniors - Graduate Students -Join Our Team !

Join our Innovations in Graduate Education Project for a Fast-Paced Semester Partnering with Researchers and Industry Professionals on Challenging Societal Problems

A semester of short innovative workshops that end with student led co-authors on a conference paper and an online educational module

Join us! Email: kavitha_chandra@uml.edu to sign up and get more information 

Recently completed year 2 of the IGE project with sixteen workshops in all during Fall semester 2022 and Spring semester 2023.  We presented a set of short but insightful training activities for participants to learn about the co-creation and module design process. 

These workshops are all on UMASS Lowell North Campus and are all designed to be interactive in a project-based learning environment. Each workshop will take students a step further to the final products – the paper and the module. 

IGE Project News, Activities & Reflections

The Engineering, Sociology and Psychology Connection for Broadening Participation in Engineering

This project integrates methodologies and tools from across the engineering, psychology and sociology fields. For example, the design of focus groups for participatory action design (PAR) has been explored by this team for several years. The PAR technique engages its participants as researchers to become vested in identifying and designing solutions to problems that impact them. This has not only given voice to engineering students in improving their environment but has also created opportunities for students to become facilitators of PAR focus groups and gain leadership skills. We have integrated PAR in an Introduction to Mechanical Engineering course, in the RAMP summer program and now in the NSF IGE project. 

References, Publications and Resources

  1. T.C. Kershaw, S.T. Tripathy, H. Liu and K. Chandra, ‘Setting the Stage for Co-Creation: Using Workshops to Scaffold Interdisciplinary Research, Collaboration, and Community Building’, Proc. 2023 ASEE Conference, Baltimore, MD., June 2023.
  2. A. Smith, E. Aoki, M. Ghandi, J. Burek, C. Thompson & K. Chandra, Human Balance Models for Engineering Education: An Innovative Graduate Co-Creation Project’, Proc. 2023 ASEE Conference, Baltimore, MD., June 2023.
  3. M. Farhadi Nia, G.E. Callen, G.Aroskar, J. An, K. Chandra, C. Thompson, K. Wolkowicz and M. Denis, ‘Experiential Learning for Interdisciplinary Education on Vestibular System Models,’ Proc. 2023 ASEE Conference, Baltimore, MD., June 2023.
  4. E. Aoki, B. Tran, N. Uhunsere, S.T. Tripathy, C. Thompson, S. Sastry and K. Chandra, ‘Multidisciplinary Authoring – A Critical Foundation for Augmented Reality Systems in Training & Education’, Proc. 2023 ASEE Conference, Baltimore, MD., June 2023.
  5. B. Afonso, H. Liu and T. Yu, ‘Networkless Wireless Sensing for Bridge Structural Health Monitor (SHM), 2022 MIT Undergraduate Research Conference, 2022. 
  6. S. Tripathy, T.Kershaw, C. Thompson, H. Liu, T. Yu, J. Allen, M. Denis and K. Chandra, ‘Engaging Graduate Students as Co-Creators of Educational Modules on an Educational Topic’,  Proc. 2022 ASEE Conference, Minneapolis, June 2022. asee2022_EnagingGradStudents

Spring and Summer 2022

The seven IGE student participants who engaged in the co-creation project on CPS and PLM presented two papers at the ASEE Northeast regional conference in Boston, MA., The CPS paper addressed ‘ Co-creating a Cyber-Physical Systems Educational Module: A Project-Based Learning Approach’ and was co-authored by students Grace Remillard (UML),  Sarah Kamal (UML) and Justin An (UDC). The paper on PLM looked at ‘An Application Driven Framework for Delivering System and Product Lifecycle Management Concepts in Engineering Education’ and was co-authored by students Vacharaporn Paradorn, Sunita Singh Poma, Nathan Agyeman and Tiana Robinson, all students at UML. 

Research team (Chandra, Kershaw and Tripathy) attended the ASEE 2022 National Conference at Minneapolis in June 2022 and presented a paper entitled ‘Engaging Graduate Students as Co-Creators of Educational Modules on an Interdisciplinary Topic’.  

Spring 2023

Our workshops and training continued in Spring 2023. The following topics were addressed:

January 27, 2023: Organizing your writing (Presenter: Trina Kershaw)

February 10, 2023: Improving your message (Presenter: Trina Kershaw)

February 24, 2023: Effective collaboration (Presenters: Susan Tripathy and Trina Kershaw)

February 24, 2023 and March 17, 2023: Sequencing and presenting information in online educational modules (Presenter: Trina Kershaw)

March 24, 2023: Intercultural communication and collaboration (Presenter: Susan Tripathy)

March 31, 2023: Assessing student learning in online educational modules (Presenter: Trina Kershaw)

April 7, 2023: Presenting your research (Presenter: Trina Kershaw)

IGE research and student team attending the 2023 ASEE Annual Conference in Baltimore, MD, June 2023. Kershaw (UDC), Tripathy and Chandra (UML) will be presenting our second year IGE update on workshops designed for scaffolding interdisciplinary research, collaboration and community building. The two student teams are being represented by Emi Aoki, Ph.D. student UML who will present her team’s work on Human Balance Dynamics. Masoumeh Farhadi Nia will present her team’s work on the Vestibular System. 

Fall 2021

The first group of seven engineering students (4 graduate and 3 undergraduate) from  UML and UDC were recruited to participate in Phase 1 of the project. Students were presented with the Gold Standard model of Project Based Learning and guided on implementing its stages. The process of questioning was introduced using resources from the Right Question Institute. A writing workshop was presented to highlight some common mistakes and examples of writing compelling paragraphs. Two focus groups were conducted with the students by Dr. Tripathy. The responses provided the project coordinators immediate feedback on the students’ concerns and experiences to which necessary adjustments and resources were identified. 

Fall 2022

In Fall 2022, we began to reflect on the outcomes of previous year’s activities and student reflections. This led to an updated sequence of workshops for training graduate students on co-creation and collaboration. In all we presented 8 bi-weekly workshops that addressed the following topics: 

September 16, 2022: IGE Project overview (Presenter: Kavitha Chandra)

September 23, 2022: Technical overview of CPS topic: Developing wireless sensor networks for bridge health monitoring (Presenter: Hong Liu)

September 30, 2022: Technical overview of CPS topics: Exploring the problem of human balance and postural control and Addressing the human vestibular system and its role in helping maintain balance (Presenter: Kavitha Chandra)

October 7, 2022: Setting the stage for co-creation (Presenters: Susan Tripathy and Trina Kershaw)

October 14, 2022: Generating questions and reviewing literature (Presenters: Susan Tripathy and Trina Kershaw)

November 4, 2022: Crafting your message for your audience (Presenter: Trina Kershaw)

November 18, 2022: Balancing when spatially disoriented (Guest Presenter: Vivekanand Pandey Vimal, Brandeis University)

December 2, 2022: Overview to structuring online educational modules (Presenter: Trina Kershaw)

December 9, 2022: Identifying core values (Presenter: Susan Tripathy)

IGE Student Participant Reflections

IGE Team at ASEE Northeast 2021 Conference

 

My name is Grace Remillard and I was a senior undergraduate student (pictured second from the right) when the project started and I was a graduate student the second half of last year. I have gained so much knowledge and direction through the co-creation project. Through a hands on project based learning approach I was able to explore a topic that interested me. Being able to co-create led me to learning more than I could have otherwise. The Cyber-Physical Systems topic I worked on through the IGE project became my master’s thesis topic, giving me a direction for my graduate degree.  Through this semester activity I gained the skills needed to write a paper and present it in front of my peers and professionals. My co-author Sarah Kamal and I presented our paper at the 2022 ASEE NE conference. 

Emi Aoki, Ph.D. student in Electrical Engineering at UMass Lowell speaks about her experience in an IGE team and co-creating a project on Human Balance Dynamics in Fall’22- Spring’23 year of the project. She is presenting this paper in ASEE 2023 conference in Baltimore, MD., June 2023. 

Justin An, graduate student in Mechanical Engineering at University of the District of Columbia (UDC) speaks about his experience in an IGE team and co-creating a project on cyber-physical systems.