In this research paper, we conducted a comparative study to measure the effectiveness of the provided technical support in computing project-based learning (PjBL) courses. Students learn much better by solving authentic real-world problems through PjBL. PjBL in computing education has proven to boost student motivation and engagement while enhancing academic performance. Crucial to PjBL in computing is the technical support that the instructors can provide to students, which is required for sustained, successful learning during project tasks. Without adequate support, PjBL will fall short of accomplishing its goals, leading to a rise in student frustration, a loss of motivation and engagement, and compromised learning outcomes. Measuring the impacts and effectiveness of the provided support is imperative for fostering continuous improvement, informed decision-making, and student success. It enables instructors to assess the impacts of their strategies, improve their approaches, and utilize their resources more effectively. To measure the impacts of technical support on students during PjBL, we performed a comparative study on two undergraduate computing courses in Spring 2024, Fundamentals of Software Engineering and Database Systems. In both courses, students work on two assigned projects, one with little and inadequate support and the other with adequate support. We administered a post-survey after each project was completed. We analyzed students' selfreflection responses across four sub-scales, support satisfaction, motivation, self-efficacy, and project satisfaction. The results show a statistically significant increase in the supported project in the Fundamentals of Software Engineering course and no difference in the Database Systems course. This finding is likely due to other differences between the two projects for the Database Systems course beyond support, such as project scale. Qualitative analysis of students' responses also indicates the need for support by students in the less supported projects. Based on our experience, we reflect on the question of what would constitute a good design for studies that seek to compare two different student learning experiences.

In this research paper, drawing from our own and other computing instructors' experiences, we highlight common technical challenges faced by students in software engineering project-based learning (PjBL) and discuss ways in which instructors can support students in overcoming them so that motivation is summoned and sustained. Through the use of practical hands-on experiences, PjBL has been shown to be an effective educational approach. However, unless projects are intentionally designed and supported in a way that summons and sustains student motivation, PjBL is likely to fail to accomplish its goals. Several factors influence student motivation, including their perception of the project's value and how confident they are in their ability to complete it. In particular, challenges that students perceive as insurmountable during the project can significantly weaken their motivation. On the other hand, supporting students to overcome such hurdles can be troublesome, especially in large classes as well as classes with diversity in student backgrounds. To generalize from our own experience, we designed a questionnaire targeted at PjBL computing instructors that contained closed and open questions on technical challenges faced by students, support instructors provided to overcome such challenges, and lessons learned by instructors on the effectiveness of their support. A total of 47 responses were collected from instructors with diverse backgrounds in terms of courses taught, students' years, and class sizes. We categorized the technical challenges into three main categories, namely (a) challenges in installing and configuring software packaged tools, (b) lack of prerequisite knowledge, and (c) challenges while completing project tasks. In this paper, we present the survey results from the three categories of technical challenges, their frequencies, importance, and effective support strategies instructors use to alleviate them.

This full research paper explores the connections between students' exposure to sociotechnical engineering coursework and their sense of belonging in engineering and/or engineering identity. We applied thematic analysis to 164 responses from two open-ended survey questions that asked students how their sociotechnical engineering courses affected their sense of belonging in engineering and how they see themselves as an engineer. Using a framework proposed by Fila et al. [1] for teaching engineering within a humanistic lens to help students develop a sense of belonging and their engineering identity, we coded student responses to themes that aligned with the framework's three dimensions: engineering for, with, and as people. We found that 86% of the responding students provided comments that aligned with this framework. The strongest impact on students' engineering identity and/or sense of belonging was through characteristics associated with the engineering for people theme, which supports previous work indicating the impact of sociotechnical engineering courses on students' perspectives. Our findings show more specifically that sociotechnical courses impact students' engineering identity and/or sense of belonging largely by conveying to them the impact they can have on society through their role as an engineer. More broadly, our findings support Fila et al.'s three-dimensional framework for teaching engineering through a humanistic lens.

In this workshop, we introduce participants to the accomplishments and lessons learned from our ongoing NSF IUSE education research project, which is focused on supporting undergraduate project-based learning in computing education by developing and piloting a set of scaffolded course projects. The workshop has two main goals. One is to facilitate exchange of experiences on project-based learning among workshop participants. The other is to encourage adoption of the developed course projects by the broader computing education community.

Teaching students complex problem-solving skills using large-scale, real-world problems is challenging for both students and teachers alike. As a result, most courses use small, well-specified, toy-like problems, which are not representative of what students will encounter in the workforce. One approach that allows teachers to use large-scale problems in class is by introducing scaffolding. Scaffolding breaks a larger problem into smaller steps, which students can solve independently, while deemphasizing tangential concepts such as the complex configuration files needed to compile open-source software systems. Strong scaffolding supports student learning, preventing them from getting bogged down with unnecessary tasks or overwhelmed by complexity. This work investigates a scaffolded problem-based-learning module for computing courses, using a realistically-sized project with characteristics representative of the industry. The project was implemented in a computer science course with roughly 100 students, and the results speak to the importance of scaffolding for student success. In fact, there were two student assignments that lacked sufficient scaffolding, compared with other tasks, and the reduction in student scoring and persistence shows that project scaffolding is necessary when implementing these types of assignments. Most students felt the project helped prepare them for a job in their chosen field.

This qualitative research performs a thematic analysis of the learning objectives in existing project-based undergraduate software engineering courses to align them with the competency model defined in the Computing Curricula 2020 reports (CC2020). This study identifies the trends, strengths, and gaps in how the reviewed course learning objectives cover the knowledge, skill, and disposition components of the CC2020 competency model. The learning objectives were categorized according to knowledge elements, skills, and dispositions as defined in the CC2020 competency model. Our analysis shows that 54% of knowledge elements from the reviewed learning objectives do not have any skill level specified and overall, only two out of the eleven dispositions in CC2020 are specified (“Collaboration” and “Professional”). We also find that technical knowledge elements from the software development category (e.g., software process, software design, and software quality, verification & validation) and systems modeling category (e.g., systems analysis & design, and requirements analysis and specification), probably unsurprisingly, are covered the most often. Similarly, collaboration & teamwork, and oral & written communication are unsurprisingly the most common professional & foundational knowledge elements in the reviewed course's learning objectives as they are essential to project-based learning. Although they are essential for the completion of a successful software project, knowledge elements such as time management, security technology & implementation, and user experience design are rarely mentioned. We discuss the implications of our findings on course design.

This research full paper explores first-year engineering (FYE) students’ attitudes toward and understanding of engineering, investigating differences among male and female students in two different courses: Engineering and Society (ES110), a sociotechnical course, and Physics I (PH131). A pre/post survey was used to understand how student attitudes toward and understanding of engineering were affected after taking these courses. Four cohorts of students over three fall semesters (2018-2020) were examined: males in ES110; females in ES110; males in PH131; and females in PH131. Our results confirmed previous findings - compared to the control group, ES110 students showed more positive outcomes in terms of academic and engineering self-confidence and their understanding of engineering. Male/female comparisons revealed some interesting findings. Compared to their male counterparts, female PH131 students experienced a greater drop in academic and engineering self-confidence. In ES110, females showed a greater increase in engineering self-confidence, but a greater drop in their engineering sense-of-fit, yet they began with higher pre-scores - across all cohorts - and ended with post-scores similar to their male peers for this subscale. All student scores dropped in the sense-of-fit subscale, although the post-scores for ES110 students were slightly higher than for PH131. ES110 females’ post-scores were the highest across all cohorts for two subscales (engineering self-confidence; understanding of engineering) and were the second highest for the other two subscales. PH131 females’ post-scores were the lowest across all cohorts for three subscales (academic and engineering self-confidence; satisfaction with engineering/sense of fit). Overall, our results indicate that first-year students benefit from taking a sociotechnical engineering course in their first semester, compared to a strictly technical curriculum, and those benefits are even greater for female students.

Engineering and Society, a course designed for first-year engineering (FYE) students and non-majors, was introduced in spring 2011 and most recently (F2014) became part of the required FYE core curricula. In addition to traditional elements of an FYE course such as the study of engineering disciplines and a team-based design project, students explore the various ways non-technical factors influence the development and integration of technology within our society, aligning with many of the learning outcomes specified by ABET General Criterion 3. Student outcomes were measured with a relatively simple pre-test/post-test study that uses a self-constructed on-line survey. Relative to the control group, students who enrolled in the course showed significantly greater gains in self-confidence, most notably with respect to engineering problem solving and design; sense of fit within the engineering profession; and understanding of the broad nature of engineering, including the importance of creativity, ethics, and societal influences to engineering design and decision making. Changes in academic self-confidence and satisfaction with the decision to study engineering were somewhat mixed, yet students in the course expressed a significant increase in their confidence of remaining in an engineering major throughout college, while students in the control group expressed a slight but not significant decline.

Energy literacy was measured among a sample of middle school students (n=865) before (pre) and after (post) their middle-level physical science course using a written quantitative questionnaire developed for this research. Overall, students demonstrated significant cognitive gains, with no significant change in their energy-related affect, self-efficacy, or behavior scores. A sub-set of students who participated in project-based energy curricula demonstrated greater cognitive gains, particularly on items that related to topics that were more practical and related to everyday life. One group of project-oriented students who were academically challenged demonstrated significant gains on every non-cognitive subscale score. Qualitative outcomes indicate that most project-oriented students thought more about their energy consumption and made a greater effort to conserve energy, after studying energy in school. They also reportedly talked more with their families about saving energy, felt more strongly about saving energy, developing and using renewable energy resources. The findings underscore the complex relationship between knowledge, affect, and behavior, confirming that energy-related behaviors are more strongly related to affect than to knowledge, and support the benefits of project-based instruction for improving students' broad energy literacy.