Education Commons^™

It Takes A University: Oer And The Psu Reduce Student Costs Initiative, Marilyn K. Moody

Library Faculty Publications and Presentations

OER have a major role to play in student affordability efforts. Portland State University’s Reducing Student Costs Initiative is a broad-based effort to reduce student textbook and course materials costs. This presentation looks at the opportunities and challenges of involving stakeholders from across the campus in this initiative, including faculty, staff, students, administrators, donors, and external partners. OER related strategies of the Initiative, including plans for increasing OER use in courses and programs are described.

The Initiative’s work and implementation plans involving the adoption, use, and creation of OER include:

• Developing courses and programs that utilize OER, including online flexible …

Going Deep: Reflections On Teaching Deep Ecology In Costa Rica, Heather L. Burns, Jeffrey Briley

Educational Leadership and Policy Faculty Publications and Presentations

Sustainability education aims to help learners understand their interconnectedness with all life, to become creative problem solvers and active citizens, and to engage personally and intellectually in shaping our common future. Experiential learning and critical pedagogy are central to providing opportunities for learners to engage in transformative sustainability learning. The short-term study abroad course, Theory and Practice of Sustainability in Costa Rica, provides one example of sustainability learning through the lens of deep ecology. This short term study abroad course was designed to create sustainability learning that is transformational, thematic and co-created, focuses on multiple perspectives and questions dominant paradigms, …

Enhancing Freshman Engineering Instruction With In-Class Interaction Systems And E-Books, Branimir Pejcinovic, Phillip K. Wong

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Electrical engineering students in our department take a year-long series of courses which introduces electrical engineering as a discipline and provides good grounding in engineering problem solving and programing. We have recently attempted to make the second course in the sequence more engaging by applying active learning techniques, including assigned reading and exercises prior to lectures, in-class exercises using a classroom interaction system, and programming exercises during lectures. Our results are mixed: while we think that students have learned more than if we had not used these techniques, we have not completely won over our students. While using an e-book …

Development And Uses Of Iterative Systematic Literature Reviews In Electrical Engineering Education, Branimir Pejcinovic

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

It is expected that most, if not all, graduate students will posses skills necessary for doing literature reviews. It is less clear how to teach these skills most effectively especially to students who are area novices and unfamiliar with review process. Systematic literature reviews offer a solid instructional framework which can be implemented across curriculum and offer an opportunity to teach course material differently so that student learn not just the literature review technique itself but also some segment of the course material. Our pilot study investigated issues related to practical implementation of systematic literature reviews in two classes, with …

Teaching Matlab And C Programming In First Year Electrical Engineering Courses Using A Data Acquisition Device, Phillip Wong, Branimir Pejcinovic

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Our industry partners often voice a complaint that our newly graduated electrical engineering (EE) students do not have sufficient programming skills. This is not a new concern. In a traditional undergraduate EE curriculum, one or two programming courses compose the entirety of the student’s training in programming. The courses may be taught by the computer science department without significant emphasis on engineering fundamentals. While the principles of computer science may be well covered, the ability to apply the knowledge to practical engineering problems is frequently lacking. To compound the problem, teaching novices the basics of programming can be very challenging …

Using Systematic Literature Reviews To Enhance Student Learning, Branimir Pejcinovic

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Publications and Presentations

Literature review is a skill assumed to be in the arsenal of all graduate students pursuing thesis options at the MS or PhD level. There are many resources on writing literature reviews, from campus writing centers to books such as Machi and McEvoy. One would also assume that this is among the very first tasks that research-oriented students would undertake. However, our brief and preliminary survey of graduate students in our electrical and computer engineering department showed that they have very little to no experience in performing literature reviews, and discussions with other faculty confirmed this observation. Unlike some other …

Examining Edd Dissertations In Practice: The Carnegie Project On The Education Doctorate, Valerie A. Storey, Micki M. Caskey, Kristina A. Hesbol, James E. Marshall, Bryan D. Maughan, Amy Wells Dolan

Education Faculty Publications and Presentations

In 2007, 25 colleges and schools of education (Phase I) came together under the aegis of the Carnegie Project on the Education Doctorate (CPED) to transform doctoral education for education practitioners. A challenging aspect of the reform of the educational doctorate is the role and design of the dissertation or Dissertation in Practice. In response to consortium concerns, members of the CPED Dissertation in Practice Awards Committee conducted this action research study to examine the format and design of Dissertations in Practice submitted by (re) designed programs. Data were gathered with an online survey, interviews, analyses of 25 Dissertations in …

Putting Impact First: Community-University Partnerships To Advance Authentic Neighborhood Sustainability, Michelle L. Holliday, Tony Defalco, Jacob Sherman

Institute for Sustainable Solutions Publications and Presentations

This article profiles a partnership between the Living Cully ecodistrict and Portland State University’s Sustainable Neighborhoods Initiative. The case studies presented in this article explore how Living Cully leveraged PSU assets to advance their goals, highlighting successes and lessons learned. This article also addresses how the partnership was formed, what makes the partnership innovative, the role of interdisciplinary/intercommunity organizational strategies, and how the community partner commits to urban sustainability and social justice.

Beyond The University: An Initiative For Continuing Engagement Among Alumni, David Osborn, Jennifer Alkezweeny, Kevin Kecskes

Public Administration Faculty Publications and Presentations

In an effort to leverage students’ positive community engagement experiences as they transition to and become alumni, Portland State University (PSU) embarked on a pilot “Continuing Engagement Program.” This article provides a rationale for this effort, an overview of the programmatic elements, lessons learned, and future engagement strategies. The authors situate the Community Engagement Program (CEP) in the current alumni engagement literature, share findings from the PSU program, and hope to inspire additional creative thinking and action to support alumni and other community members’ persistent engagement for positive community change.

Enacting True Partnerships Within Community-Based Learning: Faculty And Community Partners Reflect On The Challenges Of Engagement, Seanna Kerrigan, Vicki L. Reitenauer, Nora Arevalo-Meier

Public Administration Faculty Publications and Presentations

In the past two decades, the literature on campus-community partnerships as core components of pedagogies of engagement has grown exponentially. In this article, the director and a longtime faculty member of Portland State University’s capstone program report on interviews conducted with ten faculty-community partner pairs, gleaning insights on both the challenges of and lessons learned through partnering. This research adds to the literature through its use of relational methods that bring the voices of interviewees to readers, revealing a depth of connection across the institutional divide.

Cultivating Community: Faculty Support For Teaching And Learning, Celine Fitzmaurice

University Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Emerging approaches to faculty support are moving away from a “fixing” model to a “relational” model. In this article, the author describes a program of faculty support that places trust and community-building at the center of its efforts. The result is a program in which faculty members engage in a peer-to-peer approach to mentoring, professional exchange, assessment, and reflection.

Sustaining Change: Successes, Challenges, And Lessons Learned From Twenty Years Of Empowering Students Through Community-Based Learning Capstones, Seanna M. Kerrigan

University Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

More than four thousand students engage in the community-based learning capstone program every year by enrolling in one of 240 senior-level courses that culminate their undergraduate education. In this article, the author shares the context and history of the program, its foundational principles and processes, and the nuts-and-bolts details of the ongoing operation of the largest community-based learning capstone program in the United States.

From Capstones To Strategic Partnerships: The Evolution Of Portland State University’S Community Engagement And Partnership Agenda, Erin Flynn

University Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Portland State University’s (PSU) reputation as an engaged, urban-serving university continues to distinguish it both nationally and locally. Key partnerships with local, public, and private partners provide students, faculty, and staff with remarkable opportunities to contribute to the physical, social, and economic development of the Portland metropolitan region. This article traces the evolution of PSU’s engagement and partnership agenda and shares lessons learned by PSU as it seeks to better coordinate and centralize key components of its vast engagement and partnership portfolio. This reflection describes why and how PSU created an Office of Strategic Partnerships and the role of the …

Connecting Curriculum To Community Research: Professional Services, Research, And Teaching, W. Barry Messer, Peter J. Collier

Urban Studies and Planning Faculty Publications and Presentations

Portland State University’s Community Environmental Services (CES) has helped shape the Portland metropolitan region’s sustainable materials management practices for more than twenty-five years. CES’s research and program development services have benefited community partners that in turn have provided hundreds of students with rich educational experiences. PSU faculty members also advance their pedagogical and research agendas through the development of CES-affiliated capstone courses. This article explores the CES co-production model from the perspectives of students, faculty members, and community partners.

Online Community-Based Learning As The Practice Of Freedom: The Online Capstone Experience At Portland State University, Deborah Smith Arthur, Zapoura Newton-Calvert

University Studies Faculty Publications and Presentations

Given the design of Portland State University’s (PSU) undergraduate curriculum culminating in a capstone experience, the dramatic growth in online courses and online enrollments required a re-thinking of the capstone model to ensure all students could participate in this effective learning model and have a powerful learning experience. In recent years, a number of capstone courses have been developed that are offered fully online. This article examines PSU’s development of and institutional support for community-based learning (CBL) capstone courses in a fully online format. Emerging best practices and lessons learned may be useful for other institutions seeking to integrate experiential …