Process for the establishment and achievement of Program Outcomes

 

         Program Outcomes

AE Program Outcomes (POs) were approved by AE Department Council on January 2005 for publication on the department website  and other paper-form documentations including Faculty of Engineering Undergraduate Bulletin 2008 and Aeronautical Engineering Undergraduate Bulletin 2008.  Those POs reflect what we feel all students need to know and be able to do by the time of graduation.  As indicated above, our graduates are expected to achieve a level of knowledge with appropriate breadth and depth in different subject areas not only to secure jobs, but also to have the ability to engage in life-long learning necessary for career growth and professional accomplishments.

The statements of Program Outcomes are as follows:

By the time of Graduation the students of the Aeronautical Engineering Program at King Abdulaziz University must demonstrate the following skills, knowledge and behaviors: a.      an ability to apply knowledge of mathematics, science, and engineering b.      an ability to design and conduct experiments, as well as to analyze and interpret data c.      an ability to design a system, component, or process to meet desired needs within realistic constraints such as economic, environmental, social, political, ethical, health and safety, manufacturability, and sustainability d.      an ability to function on multi-disciplinary teams e.      an ability to identify, formulate, and solve engineering problems f.        an understanding of professional and ethical responsibilities g.      an ability to communicate effectively h.      the broad education necessary to understand the impact of engineering solutions in a global, economic, environmental, and societal context i.         a recognition of the need for, and an ability to engage in life-long learning j.         a knowledge of contemporary issues, and k.       an ability to use the techniques, skills, and modern engineering tools necessary for engineering practice

Furthermore, AE curriculum ensures that the graduates satisfy the requirements of Criterion 9 of ABET EC 2000, for both Aeronautical Engineering and Mechanical Engineering Programs imposed by AIAA and ASME, respectively, which include:

-          a knowledge of aerodynamics, aerospace materials, structures, propulsion, flight mechanics, and stability and control,

-          a design competence that includes integration of aeronautical topics, and

-          ability to apply principles of engineering, basic science, and mathematics (including multivariate calculus and differential equations) to model, analyze, design, and realize physical systems, components or processes; and work professionally in both thermal and mechanical systems areas.  

·         Outcomes Indicators

Infusion of Program outcomes into curriculum is the way by which the program is giving to the students an efficient learning experience to master the skills, knowledge, and behaviors defined in Program outcomes before graduation.  Once the Department Council has approved AE Program Outcomes, AE ABET Committee defined a set of indicators for each outcome.  These are statements of observable student actions that serve as evidence of achieving the set of knowledge, skills, and attitudes defined by the outcome.  These outcome indicators were efficiently used to:

1.       Map Course Learning Outcomes,  (CLOs), known in our program, following the nomenclature of Richard Felder of North Carolina State University and his colleagues, as “Course Learning Objectives” to Program Outcomes.

2.       Prepare Outcomes Assessment Rubrics to assess direct achievement of Program Outcomes.

3.       Prepare Curse-Level Outcomes Assessment Survey as an indirect assessment tool of student achievement of course-addressed program outcomes.

 

·         Relationship of Courses in the Curriculum to the Program Outcomes

As previously stated, ABET EC 2000 preparations in AE Department started in 2004 by course level activities.  In order to anticipate the expected resistance from highly loaded staff members, AE ABET Committee advanced the idea to start from what faculty members are actually doing and to go through the following process to establish the required continuous improvement cycle.  The process is explained as follows.

1.       Start from the course topics and define for each topic at least one “Course Learning Outcome” CLOs are statements of observable student actions that serve as evidence of the knowledge, skills, and attitudes acquired in a course.  They represent the answer to the following question: What do you want the students to do in order to demonstrate that they have mastered this topic by the completion of the course?  Each CLO has to start by an action verb that indicates the required level of learning using Bloom’s taxonomy. 2.       Map each CLO with its level of learning into one or more of the ABET Program Outcomes (POs), i.e. the famous 3.a through 3.k of the EC2000, to form a simple mapping matrix. 3.       Define instructional tools and in-class as well as off-class learning activities that will be carried out by the students to reach the level of learning specified in each CLO. 4.       Define the assessment tools that will be used to measure the extent to which the students will achieve those CLOs up to the specified level of learning as well as the acceptable passing criteria. 5.       Display the above course design elements in a course articulation matrix as defined by McNeill and Bellamy. 6.       Use HI-CLASS Excel tool to evaluate the results of course assessment and correlate them to the achievement of CLOs and to course addressed Program Outcomes. 7.       Specify the corrective actions to be carried out for the next course offering if some of CLOs or POs are not satisfactory. 8.       Prepare a Course Binder that includes data of Course Design, Course Assessment, achievement of each course-addressed POs, and some student work as convincing evidences of achieving those POs.

By the start of the academic year 2006/2007, AE ABET Committee carried out an overall evaluation of the preparation activities in the Department.  The evaluation revealed the necessity of some corrective actions regarding:

1. Non-technical or soft skills (outcomes d, f, g, h, i, and j)
2. Courses administered by other colleges (particularly math, basic sciences, and humanities).
3. Displaying students course work as convincing evidences of achieving program outcomes.

In response to these questions, AE program adopted the “key courses approach”, an approach implemented in other universities such as West Virginia and Southern Illinois.  In this approach key courses for a given outcome are defined as those courses that the program identifies as the most likely to display evidence of student’s work that can be used to assess that outcome.  In order to ensure assessment triangulation, or redundancy, AE program , through consensus, assigned, at least 2 key courses for each of the 11 ABET outcomes a-k and nominated each core course as a key course for at least 2 outcomes; one of them is non technical.  The course is considered as a related course for the remaining outcomes it addresses other than those for which it is considered as a key course.

Key courses identified for a particular outcome are not by any means the only courses that contribute to developing the skills students need to master the outcome.  Program enhancement requires that all opportunities for improvement be considered in both key courses and related courses.  The idea of key courses is intended to minimize the faculty workload associated with the compilation and assessment of outcomes.  It establishes an efficient process for collecting the convincing evidences required by ABET.  It also solves the problem of courses taught outside the Faculty of Engineering (math, physics & humanities) and those taught outside the program.  These courses are considered as related courses and dare not required to present convincing evidence of achievement of these outcomes.

 

Each course binder is required to display student work representing convincing evidence of satisfying the requirement of the outcomes for which the course is considered a key course.  These outcomes are known as the Critical Outcomes of the course.  Student convincing evidences are assessed, or at least evaluated, using assessment rubrics as it will be in the remaining sections. The figure displays the mapping of Program Outcomes into key courses, (K), and related courses, (R).

 Mapping of Program Outcomes into key (K) and related (R) courses