Transportation Educators Conference: Advancement of the National Transportation Curriculum Project

Oregon State University, Corvallis OR

Investigators

Abstract

Most ABET-accredited civil engineering undergraduate programs include at least one required transportation course. However, many of these courses are taught as a collection of topics, disconnected from one another and from the rest of the discipline of civil engineering. This poses significant challenges for faculty, students and practitioners in transportation engineering. The aims of the conference are to: 1) engage and train a diverse group of educators in the development and application of active learning for transportation engineering at the undergraduate level, 2) engage and train diverse group of educators in the development and application of conceptual understanding in transportation engineering at the undergraduate level, and 3) promote and facilitate the adoption of the learning activities and conceptual assessments by conference participants as well as other transportation engineering educators around the country. The conference organizing committee and expert lecturers include faculty in transportation engineering and engineering education with expertise in active learning and in students' conceptual understanding and misconceptions. At this conference, faculty participants participate in collaborative design of active learning modules and conceptual assessment in the undergraduate transportation engineering space. The specific aim of the conference is to increase the prevalence of active learning and conceptual assessment in the introduction to transportation engineering course taught by conference participants. The organizing committee is disseminating the conference outcomes to the broader STEM field through publications and presentations through groups such as the American Society for Engineering Education.