PI: Kathleen Wage (GMU ECE)
Co-PI: Margret Hjalmarson (GMU College of Education and Human
Development)
Dates: September 2005 - August 2008.
This is a collaborative project with John Buck at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth. UMassD is funded separately.
Abstract
This project will refine, validate, and disseminate a
recently-developed assessment instrument for engineering, the Signals
and Systems Concept Inventory (SSCI). Signals and Systems (S&S)
courses are nearly universal core elements of Electrical and Computer
Engineering (ECE) curricula taken by second and third year
students. The SSCI consists of 25 multiple choice questions
emphasizing conceptual understanding, not rote problem solving. The
incorrect answers, or distractors, capture common student
misconceptions. The SSCI is modeled after the Force Concept Inventory
developed by Hestenes et al. for Newtonian mechanics. The current
draft of the SSCI was developed with seed money from the NSF-funded
Foundation Coalition. To date, 28 instructors at 12 schools have
administered drafts of the SSCI to over 1000 students. In addition to
the SSCI itself, outcomes of this project include data supporting the
validity and reliability, an instructor's guide, and a development
team of S&S instructors. The development team will be a cadre of 12
faculty members who have adopted the SSCI. This team will meet
annually to review student performance data, provide expert peer
review, and guide the further development of the instrument.