scholarly journals Developing Mindsets: A Qualitative Study among First-Year South African University Students

2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 199-216
Author(s):  
Hettie Terblanche ◽  
Henry D. Mason ◽  
Barend van Wyk
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Study ◽  
South African ◽  
Personal Growth ◽  
Lived Experiences ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Student Support ◽  
First Year ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Support Programme ◽  
Support Programmes

This article reports on a qualitative study that evaluated first-year students’ lived experiences of attending a 12-week student support programme focused on fostering mindsets. Participants included 545 first year Engineering students enrolled for academic studies at a South African university. All participants completed qualitative narrative sketches depicting their experiences. A random sample of 300 students’ narrative sketches was included as data in the qualitative study. The data were analysed using thematic analysis, and Dweck’s theory on mindsets served as the theoretical lens through which the data were interpreted. The results indicate that the majority of students experienced significant personal growth from attending the student support programme. Additionally, the findings point to the relevance and importance of offering student support programmes focused on exploring mindsets to first-year students. The results of this exploratory study suggest that mindset theory should be considered as an essential component when advising first-year South African Engineering students. Furthermore, we make a case for the relevance of positive psychology-based development programmes for first-year students.

REVERSE ENGINEERING: TENSION RATCHET DISSECTION PROJECT

2011 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeremiah Vanderlaan ◽  
Josh Richert ◽  
James Morrison ◽  
Thomas Doyle
Keyword(s):  
Reverse Engineering ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Measurement Techniques ◽  
First Year ◽  
Stepping Stones ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Final Project ◽  
Undergraduate Study ◽  
Solid Edge ◽  
Part Modeling

We are a group of engineering students, in our first year of undergraduate study. We have been selected from one thousand first year students and have competed and won the PACE competition. All engineers share a common general first year, but we have been accepted into Civil and Mechanical engineering. This project was assigned as the final project in the Design and Graphics course. The project we are tasked with, called the Cornerstone Design Project, is to first dissect a product, discover how it works, dimension each part and create a fully assembled model using CAD software (Solid Edge V20 in our case). As part of discovering how it works we must benchmark it so the device can be compared with competing products. The goal of the project is to develop a full understanding of part modeling and assembly in Solid Edge, learn proper measurement techniques, and learn the process of reverse engineering and product dissection. All of these tasks were stepping stones to help us fully understand how the device, and all its components, work.

scholarly journals What Can Students’ Bibliographies Tell Us?- Evidence Based Information Skills Teaching for Engineering Students

2006 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 12 ◽  
Author(s):  
Fei Yu ◽  
Jan Sullivan ◽  
Leith Woodall
Keyword(s):  
Web Sites ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Chemical Engineering ◽  
First Year ◽  
Journal Articles ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Internet Resources ◽  
Information Skills ◽  
Upper Level ◽  
Department Faculty

Objective - This project sought to identify students’ strengths and weaknesses in locating, retrieving, and citing information in order to deliver information skills workshops more effectively. Methods - Bibliographies submitted from first-year engineering and second- and fourth-year chemical engineering students’ project reports were analysed for the number of items cited, the variety of items cited, and the correct use of citation style. The topics of the project reports were also reviewed to see the relationships between the topics and the items cited. Results - The results show that upper level students cited more items in total than did lower level students in their bibliographies. Second- and fourth-year engineering students cited more books and journal articles than first-year students cited. Web sites were used extensively by all three groups of students, and for some first-year students these were the most frequently used sources. Students from all three groups had difficulties with citation style. Conclusion - There was a clear difference in citation frequency between upper and lower level engineering students. Different strategies of information skills instruction are needed for different levels of students. Librarians and department faculty members need to include good quality Internet resources in their teaching and to change the emphasis from finding information to finding, interpreting, and citing accurately.

A FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS’ ADAPTATION TO DIFFICULTIES AT HIGH EDUCATIONAL ESTABLISHMENTS

2021 ◽  
pp. 97-113
Author(s):  
Nailya R. Salikhova ◽  
◽  
Aida R. Fakhrutdinova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Personal Growth ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Early Stage ◽  
Educational Process ◽  
First Year ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Social Community ◽  
Transition To Higher Education ◽  
Study Participants

Data from an empirical study aimed at identifying the difficulties faced by students in their transition to higher education, the overcoming of which is important for personal development, are presented in the article. The study participants (n=179) were asked to describe the difficulties of transition from school to University in the 1st year based on analysis of their autobiographical memory. The content analysis of texts allowed identifying the main themes and compiling a list of challenges, and then the frequency of occurrence of each of them was determined. According to the results, the most actual difficulties are the different aspects of integrating into the new social community due to sharp changes in the social environment during the transition from school to University. A big challenge is the need for self-organization in educational and everyday matters, planning and organizing your time. The third most frequently mentioned is learning difficulties, especially those related to mastering the material in the new educational environment. Problematic areas of adaptation to higher education that have not been previously reflected in the sources are the establishment of a common life in the dormitory, pressure from parents, the manifestation of their individuality, the increase in the length of classes and the pace of learning, romantic relationships and language barriers. The difficulties of the first examination session are much less frequently mentioned, and are more frequently mentioned when examining the current adaptation process. The results of the study can be used for the development and subsequent implementation of a system of practical measures aimed at helping students to adapt to the new environment and conditions. Such assistance to students in building a new way of life at a university, especially at an early stage of study, is necessary not only to improve the effectiveness of the educational process, but also to facilitate the processes of personal growth and development of students

Education for sustainable development in Spanish higher education: an assessment of sustainability competencies in engineering and education degrees

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fermín Sánchez-Carracedo ◽  
Daniel Romero-Portillo ◽  
Bàrbara Sureda Carbonell ◽  
Francisco Manuel Moreno-Pino
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Engineering Students ◽  
Education For Sustainable Development ◽  
First Year ◽  
Education Students ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Spanish Higher Education ◽  
Percentage Measure ◽  
University Degree

Purpose This paper aims to present a methodology for analysing the extent to which students of a university degree perceive that they have received a good education for sustainable development (ESD). The methodology enables us to quantify this perception, which, in turn, allows us to determine: to what extent the objectives related to ESD are achieved in the degree, and to compare the learning in ESD perceived by students of different degrees. The methodology is applied to nine engineering degrees and nine education degrees in the Spanish university system. Design/methodology/approach ESD is analysed from the students’ learning perception. This perception is measured by comparing the responses of first- and fourth-year students to a questionnaire about their sustainability competencies. Two indicators have been designed to analyse the results. The first indicator, learning increase, measures the declared learning difference between fourth- and first-year students. The second indicator, learning percentage, measure the amount of learning as reported by fourth-year students compared to how much they could have learned. Findings The results show that the average learning percentage perceived by students is higher in engineering degrees (33%) than in education degrees (27%), despite the fact that the average learning increase declared by students at the end of their studies in both areas of knowledge is similar (66%). Engineering students report having achieved higher learning than education students in all sustainability competencies, with the exception of ethics. Originality/value This paper analyses ESD from the student’s perspective. Furthermore, to the knowledge of the authors, this is the first study that compares the perception of ESD between engineering and education students. This comparison allows us to determine the different approaches that university Professors take to ESD according to the discipline they teach.

CAD Platform Independent Software for Automatic Grading of Technical Drawings

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanchit Ingale ◽  
Anirudh Srinivasan ◽  
Diana Bairaktarova
Keyword(s):  
Engineering Students ◽  
Spatial Reasoning ◽  
Learning Experience ◽  
Spatial Visualization ◽  
First Year ◽  
Spatial Skills ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Pedagogical Tool ◽  
Students Success ◽  
Mechanical Objects

Spatial visualization is the ability of an individual to imagine an object mentally and understand its spatial orientation. There have been multiple works proving that spatial visualization skills can be improved with an appropriate training. Such training warrant a critical place in the undergraduate engineering curricula in many engineering schools as spatial skills are considered vital for students’ success in the technical and design fields [1–4]. Enhanced spatial skills help not only professionals in the engineering field but also everyone in the 21st century environment. Drawing sectional views requires mental manipulation and visual thinking. To enhance students spatial reasoning, one of the authors of this study, conducted a class in spatial visualization. The course-learning goal aimed at improving first-year engineering students’ spatial reasoning through instruction on freehand drawings of sectional view. During the semester, two teaching assistants had to grade more than 500 assignments that consisted of sectional views of mechanical objects. This was a tedious and a time consuming task. Motivated by this experience, this paper proposes a software aiming at automating grading of students’ sectional view drawings. The proposed software will also give live feedback to students while they are working on the drawings. This interactive tool aims to 1) improve the learning experience of first year students, with limited CAD knowledge, and 2) introduce a pedagogical tool that can enhance spatial visualization training.

scholarly journals Portraits of primary school pre-service teachers at a South African university: Implications for nuanced student support

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarita Ramsaroop ◽  
Nadine Petersen
Keyword(s):  
Primary School ◽  
South African ◽  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Qualitative Content Analysis ◽  
School Teacher ◽  
Student Support ◽  
Primary School Teacher ◽  
First Year ◽  
Student Groups ◽  
Primary School Teacher Education

In this article, we report on a study of two South African primary school teacher education cohorts undertaken to investigate and understand their readiness to succeed in higher education and to plan support accordingly. Using the methodology of portraiture, we generated data from a combination of student questionnaires and examination results. Qualitative content analysis enabled the construction of six personas and three main themes. The portraits helped with an understanding of the complexity of the themes, in particular with how an identification of both the malleable and non-malleable elements affecting students' lives could inform and shape interventions for successful transition into university. More specifically, the dominance of particular characteristics in the personas provided information about which student groups required the most psychosocial and academic support and where it was required. The portraits also helped us to gauge the value of existing first-year initiatives, such as the educational excursion, for promoting student enculturation and in overcoming their initial anxieties and preconceptions. We argue for more nuanced information about students to inform a multi-pronged approach to student support that may extend much longer than teacher educators anticipate.

scholarly journals Student support to enhance student living and learning at a South African University

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Isabella Coetzee
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
South African ◽  
Student Support ◽  
Support Structures ◽  
Social Challenges ◽  
Higher Education System ◽  
Support Programme ◽  
University Of Technology ◽  
African Higher Education ◽  
South African Higher Education

Quantitative measures show that the higher education system in South Africa remains inefficient and this reality poses significant challenges to all universities. The Faculty of Humanities at the Tshwane University of Technology has added a Student Support Programme to the existing institutional student support structures. In this article, the author reflects on the experiences of student supporters who were appointe in 2014 and 2015 for the enhancement of students' living and learnining to improve success in the Faculty of Huanities. The findings indicated that this programme has indeed improved the academic performance and personal circumstances of hundreds of students. The under-preparedness of students entering South African higher education institutions was highlighted as a major obstacle in academic performances. The majority of students who are supported by this programme experience intense personal and social challenges that are by and large brought about by and as the result of severe financial needs. The student supprters were adamant in their departing statement that much more had to be done over and beyond the general and existing approach and support structures at the Tshwane University of Technology to support these students.Keywords: Student support; Student living; Student learning; Social challenges

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