2024 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Self-Evaluation of the Introduction to Scientific Research Course Design Based on the Affinity Research Groups (ARG) Model

Presented at Educational Research and Methods Division (ERM) Technical Session 18

Our paper reports the self-evaluation of a research-based course taught in the School of Engineering at the University of Bridgeport. The University of Bridgeport received funding from the National Science Foundation Hispanic Serving Institution program in 2022. The project, called Project Achieve, aims to foster, engage, and retain underserved and underrepresented undergraduate men and women, with particular emphasis on Hispanic students in engineering and computer science majors. As a part of the project, a multi-disciplinary effort among faculty in mechanical, electrical, computer engineering, and computer science designed an undergraduate course: Introduction to Scientific Research, based on the evidence-based Affinity Research Group model, one of the signature models in the Computing Alliance of Hispanic-Serving Institutions (CAHSI) Network. This 2-credit yearlong course offers undergraduate engineering and computer science students an opportunity to participate in authentic research experiences with faculty and graduate students. It has two components as lecture and research activities. Students spend two to four hours per week working on research projects as a team. The course, Introduction to Scientific Research is cross listed among Computer, Electrical, Mechanical, and Computer Science programs. The course objectives are (1) To identify real-world problems and survey their broader impacts, (2) To brainstorm possible solutions to real-world research problems, (3) To apply the scientific method while solving a real-world research problem, (4) To develop basic laboratory skills and safety procedures relevant to the project, (5) To communicate scientific information in oral formats effectively, (6) To collaborate effectively with a team to solve a scientific problem. The paper presents the faculty, graduate students, and undergraduate students' feedback and experiences as the preliminary outcomes while providing the details of the course design and its implementation in the engineering curricula.

Authors

Dr. Navarun Gupta http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8542-8310 University of Bridgeport [biography]

Dr. Navarun Gupta is a Professor of Electrical Engineering at University of Bridgeport. He also serves as the Department Chair there. Dr. Gupta received his Ph.D. from Florida International University in Miami. His interests lie in biosignal processing and engineering education.
Dr. Junling Hu University of Bridgeport [biography]

Dr. Junling Hu is a professor and chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Bridgeport. She received her Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from the Missouri University of Science and Technology. Her research areas include multiphysics modeling and simulation of manufacturing processes, multidisciplinary design optimization, numerical methods, thermal management of electronics and data centers.
Dr. Ioana A. Badara Post University [biography]

Ioana A. Badara holds a Ph.D. in Science Education from University of Tennessee-Knoxville, an M.Phil. in Immunology & Microbiology from University of Edinburgh in U.K., and a B.S. in Biochemistry from University of Bucharest in Romania. She is a Professor of Education and currently serves as Assistant Dean for Graduate Programs in the Burke School for Public Service and Education at Post University.
Dr. Buket D. Barkana The University of Akron [biography]

Dr. Barkana is the Margaret F. Donovan Chair for Women in Engineering and associate professor of Biomedical Engineering at The University of Akron (UA) since 2023.
She received her B.Sc. in electrical and electronics engineering from the Anadolu University in 1994 and her M.Sc. and Ph.D. from the Eskisehir Osmangazi University (ESOGU), Turkey in 1997 and 2005, respectively. Before UA, she was a professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Bridgeport between 2007 and 2023, a faculty member at Anadolu University between 1995 and 1999, and at the ESOGU from 1999 to 2001 in Turkey. Throughout her career, she has developed and taught undergraduate and graduate-level courses in the electrical, computer, and biomedical engineering departments. She also taught online electronics and information engineering courses at Wuhan University of Science and Technology, China, between 2019 and 2023. She is a recipient of federal funds from the National Science Foundation to improve engineering and STEM education for underrepresented and underserved students. She is an Associate Editor of Computational Intelligence, an International Journal-Wiley, and The Ohio Journal of Science and has served on many national/international conferences’ technical committees. She is a member of IEEE, IEEE Women in Engineering, and ASEE.
Dr. Deana A. DiLuggo http://orcid.org/0009-0003-4731-5261 University of Bridgeport [biography]

Deana DiLuggo is an Assistant Professor of Educational Leadership in the School of Education at the University of Bridgeport in Bridgeport, Connecticut. Her research has focused on stress and resilience in secondary teachers. She taught high school science for eight years, served as a science curriculum specialist for two years, and as a principal for three years. She has spent the last two years as an adjunct professor in teacher education and was recently appointed as an assistant professor in a hybrid Ed.D. program at the university level.

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