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Assigning Individualized Grades on a Team Capstone Project

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Conference

2024 South East Section Meeting

Location

Marietta, Georgia

Publication Date

March 10, 2024

Start Date

March 10, 2024

End Date

March 12, 2024

Page Count

11

DOI

10.18260/1-2--45507

Permanent URL

https://sftp.asee.org/45507

Download Count

21

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Paper Authors

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Gafar Abbas Elamin P.E. The Citadel

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Dr. Gafar Elamin is an assistant professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at The Citadel. He earned his PhD and Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from North Carolina A & T State University, and his Bachelor of Science in Mechanical Engineering from University of Khartoum in Sudan. Before his current position, Dr. Elamin has worked for the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, King Faisal University in Saudi Arabia, and Bechtel Power Corporation in Frederick, Maryland. Dr. Elamin teaches courses in the Thermal/Fluid and Heat Transfer areas as well as introductory engineering courses. His research interests include computational fluid dynamics and algorithms development. Dr. Elamin is a registered professional engineer in Maryland State.

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Nathan John Washuta P.E. The Citadel Orcid 16x16 orcid.org/0000-0002-4575-0564

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Dr. Nathan Washuta is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at The Citadel in Charleston, SC. He received both his B.S. and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering from The University of Maryland – College Park. His primary research

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James Righter The Citadel

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James Righter is an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering in the School of Engineering (SOE) at The Citadel. He earned his BS in Mechanical Engineering at the U.S. Naval Academy, his MS in Military Studies from the Marine Corps University Command and Staff College, and his PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Clemson University. His research interests include engineering leadership, design methods, engineering design education, and manufacturing.

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Kevin Skenes The Citadel

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Kevin Skenes is an assistant professor at The Citadel. His research interests include non-destructive evaluation, photoelasticity, manufacturing processes, and engineering education.

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Abstract

In undergraduate engineering programs, ABET criteria require a capstone or integrating experience to allow students to develop competencies in technical and non-technical problem solving. These capstone experiences typically take the form of a year-long or semester-long project that requires a group of senior students to work as a team to identify, define, design, prototype, and test their final product to solve an engineering problem. Ideally the students on these teams contribute fairly and equitably to the project so that each individual can develop their skills, but it is not unusual to see students on the team who do not contribute their fair share. Often, graded assessments in these capstone courses are team submissions and assigning separate grades to individual students is a difficult task. To overcome this grading challenge, the Mechanical Engineering senior capstone course instructors at [INSTITUTION] have adapted an effective mechanism for awarding a fair grade to each student on the senior design project team based on actual performance and contribution to the project success. This grading scheme is a combination of group assignments, individual assignments, teamwork, and leadership evaluation. The group assignments include project reports and presentations, while the individual assignments include ethics, resume preparation, reflective papers, and FE exam preparation. The course instructors, faculty advisors and observers, and peer evaluations all contribute to the student’s overall grade. In this paper, we will demonstrate the effectiveness of these grading components in assigning a fair grade to each team member on the senior design project using data from the last three years.

Elamin, G. A., & Washuta, N. J., & Righter, J., & Skenes, K. (2024, March), Assigning Individualized Grades on a Team Capstone Project Paper presented at 2024 South East Section Meeting, Marietta, Georgia. 10.18260/1-2--45507

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