Implementation of Team Based Learning in Fundamental Civil Engineering Courses

Project Lead: Huda Munjy

 

Several engineering students fail to grasp fundamental concepts in their introductory courses, such as Statics and Mechanics of Materials. The disconnect in understanding these concepts leads to historically high failure rates in these classes, which can in turn lead to increased time to degree completion as well as students leaving the major altogether. This project aims to incorporate Team Based Learning (TBL) in fundamental introductory civil engineering courses, such as Statics and Mechanics of Materials. TBL, an Active Learning Pedagogy, is designed to increase student engagement by allowing learners to leverage inter and intra team discussions, which elevates learning from the acquisition of knowledge to creation and synthesis. We expect the integration of TBL in these courses to decrease the high failure rates, which will ultimately decrease time-to-degree completion and increase retention in the major. Further, we expect TBL to be effective in decreasing the equity gap for under-represented minority students who can significantly benefit from increased peer interaction and small group discussions. The proposed project is directly in line with CSUF’s Graduation Initiative 2025 (GI2025) goal of increasing the freshman 4-year graduation rate of ECE to 10.5% by 2025. In addition, GI2025 identifies the mission of   Group 6: Bottlenecks   “to pinpoint and address ‘bottleneck’ courses, disengagement, and other patterns that have slowed out students’ progress to graduation.” This project directly addresses courses in the CEE curriculum that are identified as “bottlenecks” and aims to provide a strategy to enhance student outcomes and decrease student failure rates in these courses.