This innovative practice WIP paper describes the results for Engineering and Computer Science Students who participated in the Math Engineering, Science Achievement (MESA) Engineering Program (MEP) at San Jose State University. Students who participated in MESA/MEP have greater retention and graduation rates than students who did not participate in MEP. While the percentage of Hispanic students participating MEP has remained high at 45%, there has been no growth in Hispanic student participation. The percentage of Pell Grant Eligible students participating MEP has grown from 32% to 50%. This work describes the MEP program at SJSU and the focus groups used to evaluate the program.

In this work, which is intended to be a Work in Progress Paper in the Research to Practice Category, a novel remote testing protocol based on Cognitive Load Theory and the Theory of Situated Cognition is described. The proposed protocol reduced students’ cognitive overload during online exams by addressing student privacy, unreliable internet connections, accessible accommodations, all-or-nothing automatic grading, and false accusations of plagiarism. The described protocol relies on finite exam times and a sophisticated question randomization system. The protocol has been used successfully for five semesters, for two courses (20 sections).

In this work, which is intended to be a Work in Progress Paper in the Innovative Practice Category, the lessons learned from developing a unique summer program for transfer engineering students to help students make a successful transition from a community college to a four-year university are presented. This work is concerned with the research project that the students completed rather than the other aspects of student success that were presented during the summer program. This transfer student program could increase student success rates for any institution with a large transfer student population. While preliminary for students who completed the project results are promising, more needs to be done to increase the number of students who completed the project in the future.

In this work, which is intended to be a Work in Progress Paper in the Innovative Practice Category, the remote environment that was used to supervise students and conduct research tasks as part of an electrical engineering capstone team-based student project is described. While the students successfully completed their projects, more needs to be done to mitigate the negative effects of students feeling isolated while working in a remote environment.

In this work, which is intended to be a Work in Progress Paper in the Research Category, a pilot study of a directed self-placement exam and a workshop designed to lower the DFW rate (% of students who earn a D, F, or W) is presented. Linear regression models that included the directed self-placement exam score, differential equations grade, introduction to circuit analysis grade, and prior GPA were created, and the four-factor model, best three-factor model, best two-factor model, and the individual factor models are presented. The most cost-effective model in terms of significance (less than 0.001) and R2(0.48) values was a two-factor model that included the introduction to circuit analysis grade, and prior GPA. This suggests that the directed self-placement exam is not needed to predict student success in the author's circuits and systems course.

In this work, which is intended to be a Work in Progress Paper in the Research Category, the results of an extensive study which used three-factor and two-factor linear regression models based on prior grade point average, grades in a pre-requisite physics course, and class size is presented. In both models prior GPA was the most significant factor in predicting student success, followed by the grade in a prerequisite physics course. Even though class size was not a significant factor, removing it from the analysis lowered the R2values. The study analyzed 39 sections of an introduction to circuit analysis course from fall 2013 to spring 2018 and examined whether previously published novel treatments or class size (or both) were the reason for increased pass rates. It was found that there were no significant entry behavior differences between those students who enrolled in a traditional course vs. the students enrolled in a directed self-placement course. It was found that the sections that used the directed self-placement policy tended to outperform sections that did not use this policy.

In this work, which is intended to be a Full Paper in the Innovative Practice Category, the implementation of an improved placement exam that increased the pass rate in a junior level systems course in the author's electrical engineering department by 15% is presented. For almost 30 years the author's EE department has used a face to face exam to place students in a junior level circuits and systems course or into a review workshop. The details of the exam and suggestions about future use in conjunction MyOpenMath analytics to increase student success are also given.

In this work in progress, several models to predict student success in a sophomore introduction to circuit analysis class were created based on prior grade point average, grade in a pre-requisite physics class, the semester the pre-requisite physics class was taken, the number of units a student was taking, the number of times a student repeated the circuits class, and the number of times a student repeated any class prior to enrollment. While all models were statistically significant, the model that included prior GPA and the grade in a pre-requisite physics was the most significant for the data collection effort. While further study is needed, this is an important first step in creating a reliable model of student success that can be used to investigate educational treatments.

A four course package (six units total) consisting of two general education (GE) classes and two electrical engineering capstone classes that are taught in a highly integrated manner, that not only meets university GE requirements, but also meets the new ABET criteria in which the need to address a societal need is embedded with design criteria. The prompts for the new integrated GE/capstone Assessment results are also presented, along with methods to increase student motivation for studying GE.

Students were made to earn at least 90% on eight automatically graded (using MyOpenMath) online homework assignments to either remain enrolled (stay) or get permission to enroll (add) in a blended-instruction introduction to circuit analysis class. While this stay/add policy has caused some controversy, it was the only effective treatment to decrease the DFW rate (percentage of students who earn a D, F, unauthorized withdrawal or authorized withdrawal in one section of a course) in the regular semester offerings of the course. The DFW rate before this treatment was typically around 35% and as high as 53%. The DFW rate dropped to 17% for the same instructor after the gateway assignment policy was implemented. The DFW rate remained lower (19% and 26%) even when new (no prior teaching experience), part time faculty taught the class with the same materials, and stay/add policy. While other treatments that were tried such as making the class activities more realistic, flipped classroom, I-clickers, changing the pre-requisite from D- to C for the pre-requisite physics course, enforcing the differential equation co/pre-requisite, and switching the flow of the course to “impedance first”, did not decrease the DFW rate, they did lead to increased student learning.