MSU’s College of Engineering recently received a $300,000 grant to support a program that introduces new teaching methods to improve students’ learning experience.
The award is the second grant the program, Reforming the Early Undergraduate Engineering Learning Experience, has received from the GE Fund, a charitable foundation of the General Electric Co.
Thomas Wolff, associate dean of undergraduate studies in the College of Engineering, said he’s pleased to receive funding again.
“There aren’t many cases and opportunities where (engineering) faculty really are afforded some funding to improve their teaching and to do that on a large scale,” he said.
The grant is part of the GE Fund’s Learning Excellence initiative, which aims to invest in original, interdisciplinary education methods.
“GE as a company has learned that boundaryless thinking, teamwork, and e-skills are critical to success,” said Roger Nozaki, program manager for the GE Fund. “Through our Learning Excellence initiative, the GE Fund is helping universities and their students gain those skills.”
The first grant funded phase one of the program, which began January 1998 and ends this month. The first stage focused on developing and enhancing two service courses, which are large courses required for several different engineering majors.
“The issues there have been that, historically, these larger courses that are offered across a number of majors, from a student and professor perspective, can be perceived as second rate,” Wolff said. “We’ve worked over several years on a number of improvements.”
Nozaki said MSU’s successful use of its first GE Fund grant made it an ideal candidate for another grant. A number of other universities receive GE funding including the University of Illinois and Duke University.
“The MSU College of Engineering had shown strong results from its previous fund grant in this initiative, transforming courses, increasing learning and beginning to institutionalize change,” Nozaki said. “The new grant will enable the college to advance the current efforts, analyze key elements of their success, and spread the practices to other campuses.”
Program manager P. David Fisher said the new grant, which will last for two years, will be used for phase two of the program. The new emphasis will be on institutionalizing and spreading the advances the program has already made in teaching service courses.
“The primary thing to do now is disseminate to wider audiences what we’ve learned,” said Fisher, who is also a professor of electrical and computer engineering.
“If we can spread these lessons we’ve learned here on campus and off campus in a few years, it would prove the worth of this project.”
Janie Fouke, dean of the College of Engineering, said she’s confident program coordinators can accomplish sustainable change.
“The faculty involved in this award have taken the continuous quality improvement practices of GE and put it into the classroom so they get constant recurring feedback and improve the course based on what they learn,” she said.
“One of the things that a lot of people recognize about the College of Engineering at MSU is that they’re innovators in undergraduate education and this is one more example.”
