B-Fab: Cultivating Student Learning in the Maker Space Through Faculty Development
- Conference
- Location
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Virtual On line
- Publication Date
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June 22, 2020
- Start Date
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June 22, 2020
- End Date
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June 26, 2021
- Conference Session
- Tagged Division
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Entrepreneurship & Engineering Innovation
- Page Count
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11
- DOI
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10.18260/1-2--34201
- Permanent URL
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https://strategy.asee.org/34201
- Download Count
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428
Paper Authors
Margot A. Vigeant Bucknell University
Margot Vigeant is a professor of chemical engineering at Bucknell University. She earned her B.S. in chemical engineering from Cornell University, and her M.S. and Ph.D., also in chemical engineering, from the University of Virginia. Her primary research focus is on engineering pedagogy at the undergraduate level. She is particularly interested in the teaching and learning of concepts related to thermodynamics. She is also interested in active, collaborative, and problem-based learning, and in the ways hands-on activities such as making, technology, and games can be used to improve student engagement.
Alan Cheville Bucknell University
Alan Cheville studied optoelectronics and ultrafast optics at Rice University, followed by 14 years as a faculty member at Oklahoma State University working on terahertz frequencies and engineering education. While at Oklahoma State, he developed courses in photonics and engineering design. After serving for two and a half years as a program director in engineering education at the National Science Foundation, he took a chair position in electrical engineering at Bucknell University. He is currently interested in engineering design education, engineering education policy, and the philosophy of engineering education.
Donna M. Ebenstein Bucknell University
Donna M. Ebenstein is an Associate Professor and the Emmitt Memorial Chair of Biomedical Engineering at Bucknell University.
Matthew Lamparter Bucknell University
Sabrina Shankar
Nathan P. Siegel P.E. Bucknell University
Nate Siegel teaches in the mechanical engineering department at Bucknell University. He also helps to manage Bucknell's on-campus makerspaces.
Stu Thompson
Bucknell University
orcid.org/0000-0002-3444-8503
Stu is an associate professor in the department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Bucknell University, in Lewisburg, PA. While his teaching responsibilities typically include engineering design across the curriculum, computer engineering-related electives, and senior design, his focus in the classroom is to ignite passion in his students for engineering and design through his own enthusiasm, open-ended student-selected projects, and connecting engineering to the world around them. He spends a great deal of time looking for ways to break out of the traditional engineering mold and to make engineering more broadly accessible to students. His research interest is the application of mobile computing to interesting, human-focused problems. He holds three degrees in computer engineering including graduate degrees from Virginia Tech and an undergraduate degree from NC State University.
Abstract
Makerspaces offer broad opportunities for including entrepreneurial activities, physical prototypes, and demonstrations in an array of courses and co-curricular activities than was previously possible. It can be intimidating, however, for those who are typically in an instructional role to adopt the role of learner and get themselves trained in the makerspace. Faculty may also be unfamiliar with the appropriate pedagogies for assigning student work in the makerspace, which tend to be active, inductive, and student-centered, such as entrepreneurially-minded learning (EML) and problem/project/product-based learning (PBL). To make effective use of the makerspace in class, it’s helpful to offer simultaneous support in both the technical training and pedagogical design. “B-Fab,” the Bucknell Fabrication Workshop is a summer technical and pedagogical workshop for faculty and staff that aims to boost faculty and staff comfort within the makerspace and to coach participants in the design of good EML/PBL experiences within the makerspace.
This paper discusses the implementation of the three-day workshop, the topics addressed, and the outcomes. In its three years of existence, 50 people have participated, and generated nearly 30 new or substantially expanded assignments or outreach activities that have been shared as KEEN “Cards.” Initial qualitative analysis of these cards suggests that the workshop is effective at improving faculty and staff comfort using the makerspace, expanding faculty adoption of EML/PBL, and, ultimately, benefiting students by encouraging adoption of more effective and engaging educational practices.
Vigeant, M. A., & Cheville, A., & Ebenstein, D. M., & Lamparter, M., & Shankar, S., & Siegel, N. P., & Thompson, S. (2020, June), B-Fab: Cultivating Student Learning in the Maker Space Through Faculty Development Paper presented at 2020 ASEE Virtual Annual Conference Content Access, Virtual On line . 10.18260/1-2--34201
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