Engineering Education Graduate Program Annual Review
(Updated April 2010)
Reflective student appraisal questions (Manathunga, 2005)
First, student completes form and uploads to ePortfolio.
Second, advisor downloads form, and advisor and student discuss.
Finally, the advisor/committee enters feedback and returns form to ePortfolio.
Students: In the spaces below, reflect on each of the 9 characteristics of your work as a
graduate student, and then list your goals for next year. Enter your responses in the grey boxes
under each question.
1.
Quality of work-/commitment, mistakes, comprehensive consideration of all relevant
aspects.
Overall I have made progress towards turning out higher quality work each year. I can
definitely tell a difference between the first
conference paper that I wrote for ASEE 2009 and
the several that I wrote this year for a variety of
other conferences. I have also made some
progress towards really honing in on my
disseration work, which was expedited by taking
the prelim exam.
2.
Creativity-/originality of approach, thoroughness of thoughts
This year I have been trying to look at most of the work I am doing from more than one
viewpoint so that I can use multiple perspectives
to tackle problems. This has led me to read quite
a lot more widely that I had in the past and
enabled me to be a little more creative in the way
I approach solving problems
3.
Productivity, preparation and planning- /ability to cope with work load, disposition,
setting of priorities
I have always had decent time management skills, but this last year has really tested my ability
to forecast out deadlines months in advance and
make sure that I had enough time to get things
done. I am looking forward to formal classes
being over after this semester so that I can really
focus on my research. Overall I think I was
prepared for the projects that I worked on,
although I do need to continue to improve on
determining and setting priorities.
4.
Cooperation-/commitment and contribution to peer group, interest in others
I have worked less woth the other students this year, mostly due to the fact that we are not
taking courses together. I still regulary work with
Jay and Andrea on research related activities
(mostly related to conference papers and
presentations), although Katherine and I might
work on a conference paper together as well.
5.
Communication-/written and oral
My writing has definitely improved over the last year, due largely in part to the larger amount of
conference papers that I submitted for conferences
this fall and summer. my oral communication has
not been tested as thoroughly, although I imagine
that I will get plently of practice giving conference
presentations. I am espectially looking forward to
the special session and workshop at FIE in
October.
6.
Initiative and independence-/interest in improvements, makes suggestions, supervisor
dependency
I like learning about new topics, and I really enjoy writing so I have a tendecny to have a little
too much initiative sometimes. I would like to
focus a little more over the next year on writing
some ournal articles and getting a little more
focused on my data analysis for my dissertation. I
am comfortable working on my own, but still rely
on the advice of faculty members about things that
I have never seen before (such as new conference
audiences, or literature areas that I have not had
experience with)
7.
Decisions-/ability to decide independently, willingness to take risks
While I have made strides in independent thinking over the last year I still like to get
conformation from my advisor before I start
something new, or take a paper in a direction that
might not go over well with different audiences. I
think this mostly stems from my infamiliarity with
some of the journals and norms of certain
audiences. Whats left of the aerospace engineer in
me will only permit taking calculated risks.
8.
Character-/student’s special character traits and their influence on their work, standing
in peer group and relation to supervisors
my status as a graduate student certainly infleunces the context of my research and the direction
that I take the interviews and observations in (one
reason I chose ethnography). My position in the
military certainly contributes to my research style,
soecifically related to goal setting, planning, and
accmplishing tasks. My standing in the student
group is a little odd since I moved to Femoyer, but
I prefer this relationship. I still interact socially
with most of the students, but I prefer to keep my
professional work separate. As I mentioned in a
previous response, I still frequently bounce ideas
off Jay and Andrea (they do the same with me)
because we have been able to establish a good
working relationahip that is separate from our
social time. I like to have my own personal space
to get work done, and working in Femoyer allows
me that time, even if I have less interaction with
the rest of the group.
9.
Research topic-/relevance to the field, significance, possible changes, new direction
I am currently fairly pleased with the direction that my research has taken. I am interested in
taking a bigger picture look at graduate education
in engineering departments while focusing at one
level on the presence of international diversity.
Along with international diversity I am looking at
how students learn in graduate research groups
(possibly looking at outcomes assessment) as well
as general student satisfaction, commitment and
identity in graduate education for all students. As
a second part to the study I am looking at the
influence of international diversity and other
perceptions about graduate engineering programs
that may cause undergraduate students not to
enroll. This multifaceted stidy will enable me to
look at the status of engineering graduate
education from a variety of viewpoints, and
hopefully yield some interesting results.
As far as new directions in my research the majority of those have come from the variety of
socliology and psychology readings that I have
done related to learning, socialization and identity
formation.
10. List the goals for the next year (determined in consultation with the major advisor and
committee)
Erins personal goals (may change after committee review)
1. complete proposal defense
2. Complete at least three journal articles related to research (qualitative data), which may
include: Literature review, graduate student
learning, graduate student identity development,
research group structure, influence of international
diversity on domestic students.
3. Complete undergraduate interviews or focus groups to complete qualitative data collection
4. Design, Validate and Pilot Test two surveys (graduate and undergraduate)
5. Administer surveys during the fall of 2010 to participating institution.
6. Complete at least two articles on the quanitative results, which may include: Instrument
development, gradute student results,
undergraduate student results.
7. Complete journal article on mixed methods in engineering education (personal interest)
8. Attend an international conference.
9. Graduate. I am hoping for May, but realistic for the following december.
Advisor/committee feedback:
At your recent prelim exam, your committee was very impressed with the quality
and volume of your writing about your topic. You have been very productive this
past year in terms of degree progress, data collection, planning, and generating
ideas for publications. As reflected above, your biggest challenge will be focusing
on manageable pieces for writing up your research/dissertation and publicizing the
results.