Engineering Commons^™

Integrate A Conflict Resolution Session Into The Freshman Engineering Problem Solving Course To Improve Students’ Ability To Solve Interpersonal Team Conflicts, Xinyu Zhang, Jeremy G. Roberts

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

The project-based freshman engineering course entitled “Engineering Problem Solving I” in the Fundamentals of Engineering Program (FEP) at West Virginia University (WVU) requires students to work in teams to complete engineering design projects. Many students are lacking in their team dynamics, particularly in handling inter-team conflicts, which can seriously hinder their learning and future coping with conflict. When a conflict happened within a team, students hesitated to enforce their team charters, which defines the project parameters and the team’s standard of conduct. Some students avoided confronting the difficult team members, some waited for the instructor to handle the issues for …

From Creativity To Classification: A Logical Approach To Patent Searching, Marian G. Armour-Gemmen

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Engineering students and professors need to understand and search intellectual property. In the past, librarians have instructed them on using the United States Patent Classification (USPC). In 2015, after a period of transition, the United States Patent and Trademark Office phased out the USPC and began exclusively classifying in the Cooperative Patent Classification (CPC). This adoption presented librarians a challenge of instructing students and professors in the easiest and most effective patent search. By tying patent searching to an example and presenting classification in an understandable fashion using CPC in conjunction with USPC, this writer presents a logical directed search …

Jazzing Up Next-Gen Librarians For Freshman Engineering Instruction Delivery, Marian G. Armour-Gemmen, Chanelle Pickens, Robin A.M. Hensel, Mary L. Strife, Mariam Jalalifard

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Because of the need for science and engineering librarians, both nationwide and at West Virginia University (WVU), a model of Introduction to STEM Disciplines’ Information Use and Mentoring

occurred at WVU. The engineering librarians introduced new resident librarians and a graduate research assistant to the Freshman Engineering program and involved them in teaching several engineering information literacy sessions. The goal of engaging the new librarians into the educational activities was to motivate their learning, gain feedback on current teaching strategies and fresh ideas for possible future implementation, and facilitate buy-in of the need for and role of STEM-specific librarians. The …

Integration Of Information Literacy Skills To Mechanical Engineering Capstone Projects, Farshid Zabihian, Mary L. Strife, Marian G. Armour-Gemmen

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

Searching for information and using that information appropriately is an essential part of every engineering design project. It has been reported that design engineers spend about 30% of their time searching for information. Experience shows that even senior level students have not received proper training, either directly or indirectly, in information literacy (IL). They usually search for information intuitively. For mechanical and aerospace engineering students at West Virginia University Institute of Technology (WVU Tech), the Mechanical Engineering System Design I and II courses (MAE 480 and 481) are probably the last chance to teach students about IL. In this project, …

The 360° Of Information Fluency Delivery To Freshman Engineering Students, Marian G. Armour-Gemmen, Robin A.M. Hensel, Mary L. Strife

Faculty & Staff Scholarship

For three years, engineering librarians from West Virginia University (WVU) have been teaching information fluency skills to 700-1000 freshman engineering students per year, using a specific information fluency cycle. The librarians’ responsibilities in the Fall 2013 course syllabus included teaching once in each section, providing a two-hour, in-library group sessions to accommodate almost 700 students, delivering an intellectual property Blackboard™ module for students to complete over a specific period of time, and requiring students to complete a Plagiarism Avoidance Tutorial with quiz. Some of these components are similar to those of past semesters. However, past collection of the data was …