Youtube Challenges

We have had number of challenges when making our Youtube video. We had multiple cameras filming us at different angles, and at the end we wanted to integrate them. After the initial recording we realized one of the cameras did not capture the sound, at all. Another camera, we realized, the sound was so low that we could barely hear us speaking. For this reason we had to record multiple times. During the editing process we tried best to make the sound consistent throughout the film. During the editing process, we also realized that the sound and the image separated whenever we tried to trim the video. Later we realized we had to convert the .mts file to .wmv or .avi file before making any trimming process. Another difficult part was to shrink our time to 10 minutes. When we were done, the recording was over 14 minutes. We realized that even taking out 5 to 7 seconds to trim the duration to 10 minutes was very hard, just because we wanted to have it in there.

Anyway with all that said, I am really excited with what we have. We plan to have our final meeting this afternoon, and I am really looking forward to sharing the video with the rest of the class on Monday. It has taken long hour to compile but seeing the final product (almost), it’s worth it. I hope that our video carries the message that we intended to do.

We have also had many help from Michelle (letting us use her house), James (the camera operator) and Rene (setting) and many others. We couldn’t have done it without their help.

Context and Challenge for Twenty-First Century Engineering Education (Vest, 2008)

The paper discusses important global problems of unprecedented scope and scale that engineers of the twenty-first century will face (such as making solar energy economical, providing energy from fusion, and developing carbon sequestration methods etc.). The paper makes an argument that I agree; to accomplish and meet the challenges of these global problems, engineers will have to work in a divers setting. For example, engineers of 21st century will have to: work in multi-nation corporations or globally integrated enterprises, share and distribute work, create and innovate at ever accelerating rates, work in teams of men and women from various scientific and engineering discipline as well as people from social science, management and communications. All in all, technologies that dominated in the last half of the twentieth century such as high-speed communications and high-speed long-distance transportation (i.e. globalization) has promoted new kind of engineers and engineering organizations. Engineers will need to have certain attributes and skills to help them work successfully in the 21st century.

My thought on “The Human Face of Engineering”

“Engineers…a sea of white faces, all male, all in white shirts with dark ties. This was both the image and the reality of mission control at NASA in the 1960s”. Author’s argument is that back in 1960s, engineers were all white male wearing suits in a mission control room at NASA, and that there needs to be increase in diversity in the population of engineers in the 21st century. I agree with author that it is important to increase the exposure of engineering to women and minorities. No doubt that there has been good progress on this effort. However, there is another important point I believe we need to note. It is also very important to examine that the type of engineering work in today’s society is different from that of 1960s. Engineers are no longer defined as people sitting in a room, such as a mission control room, wearing suits and a tie. Engineers are all over the places from laboratories to out on the field, practicing, managing, experimenting, innovating, designing and problem solving. So I believe there is two aspects to the question “who is missing?” First is realizing the lack of women and minority engineers, and second realizing the role of engineers has changed.

Evolvement of Engineering Profession as described in Noble and Layton

Layton looks at the balance/compromise/influence between business and professionalism in the formation and evolution of engineering societies in America. He talks about the requirements of becoming a member in the engineering society. Layton writes four different tests: 1) technical creativity, 2) ability to design, 3) being in “responsible charge” of engineering work, and 4) company or industrial affiliation for obtaining full membership in engineering society. These four tests of full membership constitute a definition of the term “engineer”. Layton goes on to discuss the complication and controversy that the tests created on who is and is not eligible for the full membership in engineering society. With this the two dominant engineering societies: America Society of Civil Engineering (ASCE) and American Institute of Mining Engineers (AIME) in the 1870s are discussed. The ASCE stood for “ideal of engineering as an independent profession” and the AIME embodied the engineering as “an integral part of business”. With both societies having drawbacks, two additional societies were formed known as the America Society for Mechanical Engineers (ASME) and American Institute of Electrical Engineers (AIEE). Both of these societies attempted to combine “the professionalism of the ASCE with the industrial service of the AIME”. These four societies were known as the “founder societies”. However, in the later 19^th and early 20^th century new were formed due to “discontent with the particular balance between business and professionalism of the parent societies”. The newer societies were “shaped by the nature of the field of technology that its members pursued”. Layton then looks at the degree of influence the professionals and businessmen are needed for a successful engineering society and its impact on society policy.

In Noble, engineering is defined as technology and capitalism. He discusses how the money always influence and is always involved in engineering. In addition, Noble writes about how engineering profession changes depending on the need of the society, “…and as the business aspects of engineering changed with the expansion of industrial enterprises, so too did the nature of engineering professionalism”. Furthermore, it was found by Wickenden that most engineers in 1884 to 1924 progressed onto management role and thus “reflected the unprecedented demand for technically trained managers in modern industry”. According to Noble, engineering is “applied science”. Noble quotes observation made by Edwin Layton, “unlike science,”, “technology cannot exist of its own sake”. With only the large corporations having the capital to “practice engineering”, engineers were “compelled to enter the employ of industry”. Therefore the discussion focused on “adapting graduates to industry,” changing the schools to meet the “specifications of industry”, and preparing the engineering graduates for “business leadership”.

As ASCE formed in 1852, the mechanical society struggled to define professional autonomy, standards of ethics and social responsibility within a context of professional practice. Similarly, in 1880, despite the formation of ASME, mechanical engineers had difficulty in defining their profession, as their roles consisted of, “primarily short-trained industrialists”, “corporation executives”, and “shop managers” and “school-trained corporate employees on the other”. As for the electrical and chemical engineers, since they had no traditional cultures to contend with, their professionalism was defined by the “position within the corporate hierarchy” and “scientific training”.

The article by Noble shows that engineering profession evolved based on the needs of the industry. Much of the article discusses on the close relationship/cooperation between industry and educational institutions and that engineers need to be trained to be successful in a large company. As for the Layton, engineering profession has been defined by the requirement of membership, which impact who is and is not included in the engineering society.

Personal answers and thoughts to guiding questions on Dall’Alba

What is the basis of Dall'Alba's critique on current views of education? (what is her argument?)

Dall’Alba’s argues that currently there is so much focus of epistemology (theory of knowing) and not at all on ontology (theory of being). She argues that ontology is as important as epistemology.
According to Dall’Alba, professional education programs needs to be more than just instilling necessary knowledge and skills when preparing professionals for practice in their respective fields. There needs to be ways to develop and transform aspiring professionals to “ways of being”, which according to Dall’Alba, is to engage young professionals with set of routines, histories and traditions of their chosen respective career to the extent that “they are manifest in the present and relevant for the future”.

What alternative framework does she put forth?
Education as Transforming ways of being.

What might it look like to design an education based on this alternative framework?

Based on reading Dall’Alba, a new design of an education system, I believe, must have following items.

1) Learning through experience – Dall’Alba suggests that teacher trainees “learn to design learning activities and to assess what students have learned. As they do, develop their own knowing and acting…, at the same time extending and elaborating their understanding and embodiment of what it means…” Some forms of learning through your own experience, I believe, is suggested by Dall’Alba. This allows aspiring professional to not only integrate what is known and clarify what is lacking in the current practice, but also allows them to take a step (or steps) towards becoming an experienced professional (transformation taking place by learning through experience).

2) Include interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary subjects into current curriculum – Meeting and learning about other disciplines allows aspiring professionals to expand their horizons, opportunities and possibilities and “potentially enriching the process of becoming”. Dall’Alba strongly suggests in the paper the importance of “interdependent” and “broader social world”, and that individual cannot become a “professional in isolation”. To develop and enrich ontology, I believe, Dall’Alba is suggesting to incorporate subjects from other disciplines into professional subjects.

3) Learn to seize on ambiguity rather than shy away from it – Learn to question the norms and current practices despite the pre-conceptions and challenges from experiences teachers. By doing, aspiring professionals would not only advance the field but develop professional ways of being. This will enable one to look into deeper questions, as suggested by examples illustrated in Dall’Alba, “Addressing or resolving such tensions involves questioning assumptions, not only about what teaching involves, but also about what it means to be a teacher.” This process is developing not only epistemology but ontology of aspiring professionals.

Ennie, McPeck and a Heat Transfer class...

I strongly believe that rational thinkers exercise their skills in familiar fields of experiences. Definition of rational thinkers, according to Robert Ennis, is when a person exhibit certain proficiencies, tendencies, and good habits. Under proficiencies, Ennis listed observing, inferring, generalizing, conceiving and stating assumptions and alternatives, offering a well-organized or well-formulated line of reasoning, evaluating statement and chains of reasoning, and detecting standard problems.

From what I have been taught thus far, this is a problem solving method for technical engineering class. Initially when I am given a problem, say for example a problem in Heat Transfer, I would first ask series of questions. Questions like, is the system I am solving a compressible or incompressible? Can I apply control volume analysis over the system? If I do, what assumptions am I making? These are questions I would ask and need to know in order to solve the problem or at least make it simple enough to be able to use an equation that I know to solve for it. I think this is a very technical procedure and without knowing these equations or knowledge, once cannot solve it. One can only solve it, when one is familiar with this field. I agree with John McPeck, when he says, “…that all such thinking, beyond the trivial, manifests itself as an application of one or more of the disciplines. Further he says: “There is no such thing as thinking critically in general”. I believe that students must learn the process of what it means to make valid mathematical and scientific assumptions.

It is very interesting that one of the class I took, my Professor insisted that I use following outline when submitting my HW. The outlines were:

1) State what is KNOWN:

2) State what I am trying to FIND:

3) State ASSUMPTIONS:

4) State known PROPERTIES

5) Write your ANALYSIS:

6) Write COMMENTS: