NSF Org: |
EEC Div Of Engineering Education and Centers |
Recipient: |
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Initial Amendment Date: | July 25, 2019 |
Latest Amendment Date: | July 25, 2019 |
Award Number: | 1938744 |
Award Instrument: | Standard Grant |
Program Manager: |
Matthew A. Verleger
mverlege@nsf.gov (703)292-2961 EEC Div Of Engineering Education and Centers ENG Directorate For Engineering |
Start Date: | January 1, 2020 |
End Date: | December 31, 2023 (Estimated) |
Total Intended Award Amount: | $65,930.00 |
Total Awarded Amount to Date: | $65,930.00 |
Funds Obligated to Date: |
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History of Investigator: |
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Recipient Sponsored Research Office: |
1 TRESSEL WAY YOUNGSTOWN OH US 44555-0001 (330)941-2378 |
Sponsor Congressional District: |
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Primary Place of Performance: |
One University Plaza Youngstown OH US 44555-0001 |
Primary Place of Performance Congressional District: |
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Unique Entity Identifier (UEI): |
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Parent UEI: |
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NSF Program(s): | EngEd-Engineering Education |
Primary Program Source: |
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Program Reference Code(s): |
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Program Element Code(s): |
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Award Agency Code: | 4900 |
Fund Agency Code: | 4900 |
Assistance Listing Number(s): | 47.041 |
ABSTRACT
The competitive strength of the nation in the technological arena depends on the success of the engineering workforce. It is therefore crucial that we develop better scientific understanding of how engineers work, as well as how their work is changing. Without well-researched and trustworthy representations of professional practice, it is questionable whether educators can adequately prepare future engineers for their careers. Yet there remains a persistent lack of research on what engineers do in the workplace. This exploratory project will help bridge these gaps by testing new research approaches to generate new knowledge about what engineers do at work. Traditionally, such research has been conducted through direct observations in a physical workplace. This approach needs to be modified since open workspaces, geographically distributed teams, and new digital tools make it increasingly infeasible to perform on-site research for long periods of time, both for researchers, funders, and study sites. Other approaches like surveys and interviews are often easier to carry out, but are limited in what kinds of insights they can provide. The novelty and exploratory aspect of the proposed study comes from taking new and different empirical approaches to study engineering workplace practices. Findings and resources developed through this project will support ongoing efforts to improve how current and future engineers are trained to succeed and excel in their job roles and careers.
In this exploratory project we will undertake innovative approaches to collecting, analyzing, and archiving empirical data related to engineering practice. This project will involve ethnographic research at multiple field sites representing multiple industry sectors using novel methods such as agile ethnography, trace ethnography, and network ethnography. These methods are new and evolving, and thus have scarcely been used to study engineering practice. Yet they appear highly promising for many reasons, including their potential to generate research findings more rapidly and with a greater focus on specific problems and questions. Such methods have started to gain traction in industry precisely due to such advantages, especially in software engineering and related fields where work is already very digital and distributed in character. The field studies proposed for this project are especially concerned with how work is coordinated and aligned within and across teams, including through the use of digital data and tools. This project will also investigate and respond to three specific research challenges: 1) aligning new data collection and analysis approaches with emerging research topics and site access constraints, 2) managing, archiving, and sharing multi-modal ethnographic data sets, and 3) exploring alternative approaches to communicating research findings, including formats and styles that are more accessible and appealing to different audiences.
This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
PUBLICATIONS PRODUCED AS A RESULT OF THIS RESEARCH
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PROJECT OUTCOMES REPORT
Disclaimer
This Project Outcomes Report for the General Public is displayed verbatim as submitted by the Principal Investigator (PI) for this award. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this Report are those of the PI and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation; NSF has not approved or endorsed its content.
The development of a well-trained engineering workforce is essential for the competitive strength of the nation. This requires that we continually study how engineers work, what they do in the workplace, and how engineering workplaces are changing. This helps us create a robust understanding of professional engineering which can then be used to improve engineering education. As engineering workplaces change, so too are changes needed in the methods used to study engineering practice. In particular, the digitization of engineering has necessitated the need for newer innovative methodologies to conduct research on engineering work. Through this project, we addressed this issue and made contributions to the engineering education literature as well as provided training and mentorship to students, thereby contributing to the production of a highly-trained workforce. We conducted research at a large utility company, a software start-up, and a larger technology firm to produce findings that demonstrate: 1) the novelty of engineering work within public and public-private utilities in relation to the training needed for engineers that primarily support maintenance and updating; 2) the changing nature of workplace learning with the use of digital technologies for working and knowledge sharing; and 3) the need to support lifelong learning of engineers, starting with their undergraduate education but continuing long-term throughout their career. In addition to these findings, methodologically, we advance the field by 1) articulating and demonstrating the use of Focused Ethnography, Netnography and Trace Ethnography as useful methodologies to study work experiences and trajectories of engineers; 2) demonstrating the efficient use of multiple researchers across sites to collect data for workplace research; 3) integrating graduate and undergraduate students in research process by embedding them into firms, and 4) reviewing prior work on the use of digital methods within ethnographic research. The use of online communities data in conjunction with interviews and participant observations is a unique contribution of our work. In terms of Intellectual Merits, the outcomes of this work contribute to the engineering education literature by advancing our understanding of workplace knowledge sharing and learning, and collaborative work for innovation. The findings also directly increase our methodological understanding and current limitations in terms of our understanding. The findings have been published and presented at the top venues for the field and shared through talks and symposiums. The broader impacts of the project come through an improved understanding of workforce development and through the direct training of both undergraduate and graduate students. Our findings related to current work practices and their use of digital technologies in particular are highly relevant for training the future workforce.
Last Modified: 04/15/2024
Modified by: Stephen C Brozina
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