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Associate of Science Degree Program to Facilitate Transfer of Students from Two-year to Four-year Engineering Programs
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Nelson, Karen J. Smith, Mary Eileen Ellis, Martha M. |
| Copyright Year | 2012 |
| Abstract | Although enrollments in engineering programs have increased slightly in recent years, there continues to be concern about preparing the number of engineers necessary to meet the work force needs of the United States to maintain technological competitiveness. Community colleges continue to represent a source of students who could potentially enroll in baccalaureate engineering programs after completing their studies at the community college, if a coherent curriculum were available that would ensure seamless migration to a bachelor’s degree and graduation in a timely manner. Presented in this paper is the basis for a highly structured statewide Associate of Science in Engineering Science (ASES) degree program, and the manner in which baccalaureate programs build upon this degree to complete the expectations for a baccalaureate engineering degree. The degree, which has been implemented in Texas, represents the culmination of several years of effort to align coursework among multiple institutions. Further, the degree represents a significantly new approach to curricula development. The paradigm is changed from viewing curricula as a number of courses to viewing curricula as the development of a necessary body of knowledge for a discipline. As of this writing, the ASES degree has been adopted by several institutions. Significant benefits of the degree for the student are that it provides significantly more flexibility compared to articulated programs and it provides a degree completion time that is nearly the same as a student directly entering a baccalaureate engineering program as a freshman. Benefits of the ASES degree for the educational institutions include elimination of the need for multiple articulation agreements and the need to reverse articulate coursework to provide reliable retention and graduation data for accountability. Introduction A statewide model Associate of Science in Engineering Science (ASES) degree program was implemented in Texas and made available at all community colleges choosing to participate and supported by participating universities. Typically, this degree is the first formal engineering degree to be offered at the community college and is intended to serve as a stepping stone to a baccalaureate engineering degree at a participating university. As ABET accreditation is a critical component of this degree, participating community colleges will seek accreditation at the earliest opportunity, normally after the first student receives the degree at that institution. Students who successfully complete this ABET-accredited degree will be accepted into selected baccalaureate engineering degree programs on the basis of this degree at partner universities, provided they satisfy all other admission requirements of the institution and program. After being P ge 25234.3 admitted, the student will follow a specified “completion curriculum” for the baccalaureate degree that is founded on the body of knowledge obtained in the associate’s degree. To be entitled to pursue the degree completion curriculum after being admitted, the student must complete the prescribed courses with an overall GPA of at least 2.5, and with no grade lower than “C.” No further testing or evaluation will be required. The model Associate of Science in Engineering Science curriculum was developed to provide students with the foundational knowledge, skills, and attitudes necessary for successful pursuit of a baccalaureate engineering degree, or for employment in an engineering firm if they do not pursue a baccalaureate engineering degree. The curriculum mostly embodies courses that are already offered at participating community colleges. In general, only three additional courses may need to be offered to complete the curriculum, and these may be available through on-line instruction from other institutions. The administrative and technical staff required at a community college is not expected to increase solely as a result of offering this degree to students. During development of the ASES curriculum, consideration was given to the necessary attributes of engineers indicated by the National Academy of Engineering in the report The Engineer of 2020, Visions of Engineering in the New Century 1 . Further, consideration was given to the criteria of the Applied Science Accreditation Commission of ABET, Inc. for Engineering Science programs, the curricular requirements of the State and partner universities, the requirements of the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB), and the Engineering Deans Council and Corporate Roundtable recommendations in the report Engineering Education for a Changing World 2 . Background on Texas Initiatives Despite well-established financial benefits to students and institutions, educational systems are not meeting either the regional or the national demand for an engineering workforce with the necessary knowledge, skills, and attitudes. Community colleges are perhaps the largest, mostly untapped, resource for additional very talented students to enter the engineering workforce. Nationally, one in five PhD graduates attended a community college 3 . Within Texas in fall 2010, the community colleges in the state enrolled 721,962 students while the universities in the state enrolled 557,550 students 4 . Annually, approximately 73% of all freshmen and sophomores in Texas are enrolled in community colleges. Eighty percent of all bachelor’s degree completers in Texas attended more than one college or university 5 . Further, the community college student population continues to be diverse, with an average of 48% minority and 42% first-generation college students 6 . The THECB recently conducted a cohort study of students entering higher education in fall 2002 7 . The study found that of the 169,630 students who first enrolled in higher education in fall 2002, 66% of the students enrolled in community colleges. Further, the study found that only 4.5% of the entering students declared a major in engineering or graduated with a degree in P ge 25234.4 engineering during the next six years. Interestingly, 74% of these students started at a 4-year institution. These statistics indicate that community colleges are potentially the single largest untapped regional source of future engineering professionals. Yet across Texas and the nation, students in community college systems with the talent and motivation to become engineers are not entering and migrating from pre-engineering programs at 2-year institutions to baccalaureate engineering programs at 4-year institutions, despite the economic and educational benefits of this pathway for the students. The question is “Why?” The students, in a series of focus group meeting 10 , provided some of the answers to this question. Comments from the group regarding community college to university transfer included: Improve advising, and expand university transfer advisors housed on community college campuses; Expand joint programs; and Multitudes of articulation agreements are confusing and not enough. Community college students interested in engineering may choose an engineering technology associate of applied science (AAS) degree or a pre-engineering associate of science (AS) degree. Many students choose the AAS degree program because it is a clear pathway to a marketable degree, and the pathway to a baccalaureate engineering degree is too confusing, uncertain, and long. Those community college students who do want a 4-year engineering degree generally follow one of two pathways. These pathways are: 1. Through an approved articulation agreement between the 2-year and 4-year institutions; or 2. By taking courses, which may or may not be the best selection of courses for the student’s proposed major, that are later transferred to the 4-year institution. This method of “course” migration has several disadvantages for the students and for the institutions involved. These disadvantages include: 1. A clear path to an engineering baccalaureate degree is often not visible, so qualified students entering 2-year institutions do not consider engineering careers; 2. An articulation agreement must be developed between each 2-year and each 4-year institution, which results in a multitude of duplicative articulation agreements between a 4-year institution and the several 2-year institutions from which students transfer; 3. Where no articulation agreement is in place, determination of course transferability is a time-consuming, labor intensive, and subjective process; P ge 25234.5 4. A defined pathway for transfer to universities is not available to community college advisors and students, leading to inaccurate information and loss of semester credit hours; students choosing one articulation agreement and then deciding to attend a different university lose semester credit hours; 5. Upon completion of the pre-engineering program at the 2-year institution, the students may only have an amalgamation of courses and transcripts to show for their efforts; and 6. Community colleges vary on the nature and quality of pre-engineering programs and advising offered, and, given this, students may have to complete as much as seven additional semesters or attend school full time about six years before obtaining an engineering degree. The THECB has taken considerable steps to ameliorate these issues through its Texas higher education plan, Closing the Gaps by 2015, and through development of statewide voluntary articulation compacts, which are discussed in the next section of this paper. Nevertheless, issues still exist that cannot be addressed solely through statewide articulation compacts, because the compacts do not address issues of quality and levels of assessment as those for baccalaureate engineering programs at the 4-year institutions in the state. “Tuning” in Texas The THECB’s goal of supporting the development of 2+2 programs to more fully and efficiently use the community college pathway |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://peer.asee.org/associate-of-science-degree-program-to-facilitate-transfer-of-students-from-two-year-to-four-year-engineering-programs.pdf |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
