Beyond the Conventional Engineering Discipline
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Session T3H
Beyond the Conventional Engineering Discipline –
Teaching Prose
Aura Paloheimo, Pirjo Putila and Jenni Stenman
Laboratory of Software Technology, Helsinki University of Technology
P.O. Box 5400, 02015 TKK, Finland, Europe firstname.lastname@tkk.fi
Abstract - The objective was to provide students with [7][8][10][11] Rewards can be classified into student
means to new innovative ways of thinking. A secondary recruiting and performance, working career and active
purpose was to deepen their cultural awareness to act as a involvement in society. [3][7][8]
realm for disruptive thoughts. To this aim, an experi- Enhancing engineering education is a complicated task
mental literature course for electrical engineering students due to long traditions, legacy practices, societal reasons and
was created. Students who participated in the literature the nature of universities’ administrative organization struc-
course were very inspired by it. Each time the literature ture. [4][5][10] However, separate experiments and local
course has been arranged, students have evaluated it as changes have been made in recent years. [1][8][9][11]
one of the top three courses of all at the Department of Teaching arts alongside with technical courses offers remedies
Electrical and Communications Engineering at Helsinki to commonly recognized social and motivational problems in
University of Technology. In this study we introduce the engineering education. Beyond this, teaching arts can be part
course concept and analyze how students benefited from of the solution for adjusting curricula to the dynamic needs
the experiment. The literature course improved four areas created by the ever-changing technical discipline. As a basic
of excellence: communication methods, innovative supporting act, teaching arts offers ways to communicate as
thinking, motivation for more traditional engineering well as networking tools and opportunities. This, in turn,
studies and networking. We comprehend that learning creates a more balanced and supportive climate for learning.
prose may not be the key interest of engineering students [12]-[14] Additionally, earlier studies suggest that
in general. However, according to our study, a literature interdisciplinary study possibilities attract all students,
course would benefit a minority of the students in their especially women, into technical fields. [11][15] This is a very
studies and career later on. strong impact considering the concern with diminishing
recruitment to courses and careers in the fields of technology
Index Terms – Diversity, education, interdisciplinary, and science in Europe. [3] On skills development, earlier
qualitative methods research suggests that enhanced education will provide
students with a broader view and more systemic thinking
INTRODUCTION capabilities. [7][8][10] Since the established curricula fail to
The current world situation brings new challenges to the deliver, we argue that achieving improvements in thinking and
engineering profession. Traditional engineering work is not new innovations calls for extraordinary means. This research
applicable as such in 21st century working life and society. Job sets out to cover a very specific, simple, yet powerful action to
descriptions are adapting to the world-wide economic and enrich electrical engineering curricula with arts in form of
cultural development. Engineering work is becoming more literature. We present the course concept and arrangements as
and more cross-disciplinary and involved in societal well as student benefits. The results unveil great potential in
processes. Driving forces for transition can be derived from the cross-disciplinary approach and the remarkable positive
globalization, changing economics, relative strength of impact it can have on the students.
countries, rapid improvements in overall and information BACKGROUND
technology as well as a variety of other reasons. [1]-[5] These
challenges must be answered by education. Moreover, it has The teaching of prose and lyrics started at the Department of
been stated that the traditional engineering education is not Electrical and Communications Engineering at Helsinki
enough. [1][3]-[9] University of Technology in autumn 2002. The first experi-
The engineering professions are in a transition period to ment was part of a larger scale gender and technology edu-
respond to changes and to adopt a new role and function in the cation project, TiNA (2001-2003). TiNA was to promote a
globalizing world. [1] Conventional engineering curricula female-friendly education culture into higher level electrical
offer little that would provide an individual with tools for engineering education. In addition to developing teaching and
work in non-engineering or interdisciplinary positions or learning practices, one aim was to develop engineering
management. [6]-[8] According to earlier research, applying curricula into a more diverse and interdisciplinary form. [16]
or mixing liberal arts into and/or otherwise enhancing the The positive effect of the literature course on the
traditional technical discipline has many advantages. participants was on such a remarkable scale that the course
1-4244-1084-3/07/$25.00 ©2007 IEEE October 10 – 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
T3H-7Session T3H
was continued in TiNA’s follow-up project, TiNA 2 – Women TABLE III
3RD SCENARIO OF THE LITERATURE COURSE (SPRING 2003)
in ICT (2004-2006). The latter project’s aim was to promote
Session Content
technology studies as an attractive and a realistic career option 1st Becoming acquainted with the team members as well as course
for young girls. In addition, the project supported women topics. What is literature? Textual analysis
during their technology studies and facilitated the transition 2nd Youth literature – Auth. ex.: Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, Richard
from studies to work. [17] Bach
3rd Classical and modern fairy tale – Auth. ex.: Faabeli, Aesop, H. C.
LITERATURE COURSE Andersen
4th Lyrics and poetry, forms of lyrics, Tanka, haiku, limerick – Auth.
ex.: Octavio Pazin, Tomas Tranströmer
The substance of the course was literature in all its forms.
5th Lyrics of Mirkka Rekola
Material was chosen from prose, short stories, science fiction, 6th Novel – Auth. ex.: Markku Hotakainen, Gabriel García Márquez,
poetry, causerie, aphorism, drama and radio play. The students Virginia Woolf
were to familiarize themselves with different possibilities and
techniques of all sort of literature. The teacher of the course The literature course (and/or the advanced course version)
provided students with suitable material. However, the has been arranged altogether six times. In 2004, the course
students were encouraged to select and produce own material was not arranged at all due to lack of students which resulted
as well. from an inadequate information process. The scale of the
The course concept consisted of six meetings and corres- course was quite moderate: each year it has been arranged, 7-
ponding homework. Sessions were positioned in such a 17 students have participated. Table IV describes the student
manner that the course was spread over the whole semester. participation each year and addresses the phenomenon of
Each session lasted 3-4 hours. It was possible to carry out the students taking the course twice or even three times. The
course in two mutually exclusive ways: a student could either number of participants is, for technical reasons, the number of
accept one credit, which required participation in five sessions students who actually passed the course or received a grade
and there was no homework to be done, or carry out a two from it. There is a two person difference between ‘the official
credit version, which required participation in four to five number of participants’ and the number of students who
sessions as well as accomplishment of four homework participated in the course in autumn 2003. This is most
assignments. Mr. Kosti Sironen, Bachelor of Arts, writer and probably due to the fact that there were two participants on the
adult education specialist, acted as the teacher of this course. course, who did not participate in enough sessions to receive
The framework and themes of the meetings varied from year credits or grade, but nevertheless answered the course
to year. For example, an excerpt of the schemes used in this evaluation form.
course is represented in Table I, II, and III. It is noteworthy that the spring course has officially been
an ‘advanced’ version, even though there are no notable
TABLE I structural differences between the two courses (see the
1ST SCENARIO OF THE LITERATURE COURSE (AUTUMN 2002)
Session Content
description of content of the courses earlier). The basic-
1st Becoming acquainted with the team members as well as course advanced distinction could partly explain the larger amount of
topics. What is literature? Textual analysis second timers in the spring semester course. However, the
nd
2 Short stories as a form of literature, emergence of short stories phenomenon appears to be more complex than mentioned
3rd Short stories continued – Author examples (Auth. ex.): Giovanni above. For instance there was a student who had participated
Boccaccio, Joni Skiftesvik, Raija Siekkinen
4th Short stories and epic poetry – Auth. ex.: Jayne Ann Phillips, Rosa in this course both autumn 2002 and autumn 2006.
Liksom, Istvan Örkényi
5th Causerie – Auth. ex.: Olli, Raimo Vaahtera, Aapeli TABLE IV
6th Novel – Auth. ex.: Hannu Raittila LITERATURE COURSE, YEAR/TERM, (PASSED) PARTICIPANTS, SECOND AND
THIRD TIMERS
TABLE II Year / Term Number of Second Third Timers
2ND SCENARIO OF THE LITERATURE COURSE (AUTUMN 2003) Participants Timers
Autumn 2002 17 - -
Session Content
Spring 2003 16 8 -
1st Becoming acquainted with the team members as well as course
Autumn 2003 7 2 1
topics. What is literature? Textual analysis
Autumn 2005 13 1 -
2nd Lyrics – Auth. ex.: Tomi Kontio, Heli Laaksonen
Spring 2006 10 7 1
3rd Concept of perspective in literature and authorship
th Autumn 2006 12 2 2
4 Virginia Woolf: Mrs. Dolloway
5th Gabriel García Márquez: One Hundred Years of Solitude
6th Theory and text analyses. End discussion The literature course was aimed at the students of the
Department of Electrical and Communications Engineering.
However, during the years 2003-2006 40 % of the students on
the course came from other study programs. Most visitors
came from the Computer Science, Architecture and
Information Networks study programs. Students at all stages
of their studies, from freshmen to near-graduates, participated
in the course. It is noteworthy that the gender balance in this
1-4244-1084-3/07/$25.00 ©2007 IEEE October 10 – 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
T3H-8Session T3H
course differs significantly from the gender balance in the a qualitative background study of one year’s students’
department overall. Female students make up a substantially applications to this course was completed. Finally a qualitative
larger proportion of the students in this course than in the post course inquiry was conducted. In this inquiry the students
whole department. Figure 1 illustrates this phenomenon. wrote about their views on the course, life and career plans.
At the beginning of the basic course evaluation form,
students assessed the quality of the course structure according
Department situation 2002-05
to basic criteria. This data has been collected and analyzed
from autumn terms 2003, 2005 and 2006. The purpose of this
Course Autumn 2006
query was merely to collect data for course development and
overall quality evaluation. The basis of this questionnaire was
Course Spring 2006 a traditional five point (1-5, 1: poor, 5: excellent) Likert scale
survey on course characteristics. The evaluation criteria were
Course Autumn 2005 as follows:
- Overall assessment of this course
Course Autumn 2003 - Evaluation of the material in this course
- Evaluation of the teacher in this course
Course Spring 2003
- Course workload compared to credits (1 – too much
work, 5 – too little work)
Basic numerical analysis was done based on criteria: average,
Course Autumn 2002
variance and standard deviation. The results of this analysis
will be presented later in this paper.
0 % 20 % 40 % 60 % 80 % 100 %
Additionally, the students were asked to answer 1-2
optional questions about their ideas and thoughts of the
Female Alteration Male course, its usefulness and possible development ideas. In two
FIGURE 1 of the arranged course instances (2003, 2005), the students
GENDER BALANCE ON DEPARTMENT OF ELECTRICAL AND COMMUNICATIONS were additionally asked whether they considered the course
ENGINEERING STUDENTS COMPARED TO THE GENDER BALANCE OF STUDENTS suitable as a part of the engineering curriculum.
PARTICIPATING THE LITERATURE COURSE (YEARS 2002-2006).
The second part of the study consisted of the students’ old
The age distribution in the course varied somewhat from applications for the course. In 2003 students were asked to
year to year. However, it can be stated that the course was create an informal application for permission to participate in
more attractive to the students close to graduation than the course. Student applications were analyzed mostly for
beginners. Twice, all participants were at least on their 3rd development purposes to guide construction of the qualitative
study year. Figure 2 illustrates the study year distribution of post-course inquiry later on. The results are not presented in
participants during the course history. This gives a rough this paper as they are within the scope of a separate study.
estimate on the student variation on this matter. Encouraged by the extremely positive results received
from the two routine questionnaires mentioned above, an idea
30
of a more in-depth qualitative post-course inquiry arose. The
qualitative post-course inquiry was created in autumn 2006
Number of participants
25 and it was sent to all participants in the course since it was
20
held the first time in autumn 2002. The intent of this study was
to reach some of the students across the years, and scan the
15 influences and long-term implications of the course for these
students. The current contact information of students from
10
2002-2006 were gathered and the students were sent inquiries
5 by email. The high importance of each student’s answers was
emphasized, and they were encouraged to write as freely as
0
they liked about anything they wanted. The questions of this
1st year 2nd 3rd year 4th year 5th year N/A
year or more
inquiry are briefly presented below.
1. Elaborate on your reasons for participating in this
Study year of participant
course. In case you participated more than once, what
were the grounds for re-run?
FIGURE 2 2. In a longer temporal perspective, what were the best
COURSE PARTICIPANTS’ STUDY YEAR DISTRIBUTION (YEARS 2002-2006)
offerings on the course? (Ideas, thoughts, high spirits,
literacy awareness, motivation toward studies, joy of
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY life, etc..)
3. Do you consider it likely that you will contact other
Research was conducted in three different phases. First a students from the course later on? In what kind of
mostly quantitative basic course evaluation was made. Second
1-4244-1084-3/07/$25.00 ©2007 IEEE October 10 – 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
T3H-9Session T3H
situations? (For example, work or leisure time related TABLE VII
TOP FIVE COURSES 2005 – NEARLY 150 COURSES EVALUATED, STUDENT
common interests?) FEEDBACK AVERAGE 3,6
4. Have you contacted the other students from the Position Course Student Number of
course? For what reason? Appraisal Students
5. Draw freely from the stream of your consciousness of 1. Circuit Simulation with APLAC II 4.69 16
how your life has been after the course. How do you 2. Circuit Synthesis 4.6 10
3. Literature course 4.5 12
consider yourself as a person and a student? What are 4. Design of Electric Drives 4.5 6
your plans for the future? 5. Reliability of Micro- and Nanosystems 4.5 8
The questions on the inquiry form were chosen to be very
open and broad for the purpose of gathering information the
The basic numerical characteristics of the course feedback
students did not intentionally reveal: merely asking students
how they found the course was not enough to acquire this forms of years 2003, 2005 and 2006 are presented in Table
information. The fifth, (seemingly) irrelevant and irrational, VIII below. The evaluation of the course material is not
very widely scoped question, gave the students an open space presented, as the results from this evaluation are considered to
to describe themselves and unintentionally reveal their true be misleading. The reason for this is that even though the
opinions on the course and its effectiveness. The answers were overall evaluation of the course material was altogether good
carefully analyzed and common features were categorized. or excellent, the material has been varying from year to year
Connective and distinctive features were sought and compared i.e. the answers would not be reliably comparable. Our
working assumption has been that the course material should
to factors such as gender, course participation and overall
study year and the respondent’s characterization of himself. not be considered essential. In fact, this study aims at finding
The results were processed into a distilled summary. the main substance and the benefits of the course to exist
outside the varying course material. The hypothesis that such a
RESULTS common denominator exists is validated by the fact that the
course has remained popular despite the variation in the
The starting point for the more in-depth research was the fact material. While Table VIII illustrates the main figures, the
that the students had evaluated the literature course as one of more precise characteristic definitions can be found in the
the top three courses of all at the Department of Electrical and methodology section.
Communications Engineering three times. This is considered
to be a significant finding which could be utilized for the TABLE VIII
benefit of education at the department in general. The MAIN CHARACTERISTICS FROM COURSE EVALUATION FORMS FROM YEARS
2003, 2005 AND 2006
students’ evaluation process was based on the course feedback
Year and Course Characteristic Average Variance Standard
system, which covers practically all courses held at this Deviation
department, making the results comparable. The system is 2003 (9 answers):
based on a five point (1-5) Likert scale survey on course Overall assessment of the course 4,67 0,11 0,5
characteristics. Tables V, VI and VII show the top 5 courses of Assessment of the teacher 4,33 0,25 0,5
Credits compared to workload 3,11 0,25 0,33
2002, 2003 and 2005. The numerical values shown are
students’ overall assessment of each particular course (1 poor 2005 (12 answers ):
– 5 excellent). Overall assessment of the course 4,58 0,27 0,51
Assessment of the teacher 4,5 0,27 0,52
TABLE V Credits compared to workload 3,08 0,08 0,29
2002 TOP FIVE COURSES - 109 COURSES EVALUATED, STUDENT FEEDBACK
AVERAGE 3.63 2006 (6 answers):
Overall assessment of the course 4,17 0,57 0,75
Position Course Student Number of
Assessment of the teacher 4,17 0,57 0,75
Appraisal Students
Credits compared to workload 2,83 0,17 0,41
1. Circuit Simulation with APLAC 4.7 23
2. Literature course 4.55 11
3. Audio Signal Processing 4.54 24
4. Research Seminar on Computational As Table VIII depicts, the student evaluation of the course
and Cognitive Bioscience 4.5 6 has been excellent and very uniform. Variances and standard
5. Steering of Electronic Drives 4.43 7
deviations are relatively small. It is worth mentioning,
however, that in 2006 the course was not evaluated as
TABLE VI
2003 TOP FIVE COURSES - 134 COURSES EVALUATED, STUDENT FEEDBACK extremely excellent as in the years before. This is due to the
AVERAGE 3.64. small amount of questionnaire forms filled in: As one of the
Position Course Student Number of students assessed the course as only ‘good’, it has great impact
Appraisal Students on the results. This particular answer raises the variance and
1. Circuit Simulation with APLAC 4.67 12 standard deviation figures as well.
2. Literature course 4.67 9
3. Special Course in Industrial Electronics 4.56 9 Students answered the open questions in course
4. Circuit Analysis 1 (PBL version) 4.55 22 evaluation forms very actively. Without exception students
5. Audio Signal Processing 4.5 20 considered the literature course very well suited for an
engineering curriculum. The motivations for having the course
1-4244-1084-3/07/$25.00 ©2007 IEEE October 10 – 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
T3H-10Session T3H
as a part of engineering studies were grouped into two main its importance: while the students answered the first questions
categories: professional needs and counterbalance to more somewhat moderately (and even in a predictable manner), they
traditional studies. Regarding the question of students’ ideas, were much more open in describing themselves and their
thoughts and impressions of the course, the answers formed overall life and situation. In their answers, they additionally
uniform basic themes (themes are not introduced in order of characterized the course in stronger phrases than in the earlier,
importance): more formal, question setting. Some of the students wrote
- Importance of literature both in the engineering about extremely intense benefits from the course. Since they
profession and overall life were mostly describing their life, they were very open to just
- Benefits of this course for (expansive) thinking and mention in subordinate clauses statements like ‘by the way,
learning the course changed my life’. From the respondents’ answers,
- Overall inspiration four themes of skill improvement were found.
- People and interaction
With regard to the course’s future development, the most Communication methods: The students considered they
frequently reoccurring proposals mentioned the needs for had strengthened their competence in self-expression, writing,
more people and interaction, more freedom and some minor text analysis, conversation skills and sharing ideas with other
changes in the processed literature. people.
Sixteen students answered the post-course inquiry. Innovative thinking: The respondents depicted in different
Students were reached from each individual conducted course ways how the particular course enhanced and reformed their
except autumn 2003. Figure 3 depicts the respondent ways of thinking. The course had improved their creativity.
distribution by year and term they participated in this course. They generated new ideas and gained a broader view towards
Gender of respondent as well as the number of times their (engineering) studies and profession as well as towards
respondent has taken the course has also been illustrated. The life and society. One respondent stated that one learned to
study year distribution is not illustrated since it is in unison think on this course.
with the overall course participant study year distribution Motivation for more traditional engineering studies: To
depicted earlier. some of the respondents, the course acted as a motivator for
conducting their traditional courses and thesis required for
8 diploma. More generally, the idea of the course acting as a
Number of respondent per course
7 counterbalance and uplifting experience in the middle of
complicated electronics and engineering courses was shared
6 with almost all respondents.
5 Networking: Almost all of the respondents mentioned the
4
people and conversation as very important benefits from this
course. A minority of respondents gained true connections and
3 started common projects with other students they met on this
2 course. However, regarding this matter, variation was high.
1
Many of the students did not intentionally meet others at all
after the course was over. Most of them felt they could contact
0 others if they had some ideas for co-operation.
Autumn Spring Autumn Autumn Spring Autumn
2002 2003 2003 2005 2006 2006 Other heavily emphasized benefits were the social
Individual conducted course aspects: meeting new people, interacting and sharing ideas.
The course was seen as an uplifting and life-enriching
Single timer Male Double timer male Single timer female experience of great importance. The varying content of the
Douple timer female Triple timer female
course, from prose to lyrics, did not seem to have an effect on
the responses. The overall importance of substance: literature,
FIGURE 3 cultural awareness, writing and text analysis, was recognized.
THE DISTRIBUTION OF INQUIRY RESPONDENTS BASED ON COURSE However, one participant revealed that he/she did not come to
PARTICIPATION YEAR, GENDER AND THE AMOUNT OF TIMES THEY HAVE the course because of the literature, but merely to gain a
PARTICIPATED IN THE COURSE
counterbalance for other studies and meet people, i.e. acquire
The answers varied from very short and precise listings social stimuli.
into life stories of several hundreds of words. The first answer CONCLUSIONS
came one hour after the inquiries were sent in the middle of
the night. Based on experience of such inquiries, this sort of This study reveals that enriching engineering curricula
activity in giving feedback was regarded as extraordinary. with arts in form of literature is extremely profitable. Our
Many respondents shared the researcher’s enthusiasm toward results are unisonous and clear on the fact that our course
the phenomenon in question. They considered the course concept is an excellent tool to support and equip students for
meaningful and of great importance. The fifth question proved their future working life. It appears that a cross-disciplinary
1-4244-1084-3/07/$25.00 ©2007 IEEE October 10 – 13, 2007, Milwaukee, WI
37th ASEE/IEEE Frontiers in Education Conference
T3H-11Session T3H
approach is suitable for opening mental locks that often hinder REFERENCES
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