Incorporating service-learning within engineering and technology education in secondary schools

Craig L Smiley, Purdue University

Abstract

This study focuses the status of service-learning incorporated into the secondary engineering and technology classroom in the State of Indiana. Post-secondary engineering service-learning programs have been found to increase student interest in engineering to attract females into engineering (Coyle, Jamieson, & Oakes, 2005). Engineering, Design, and Development (EDD) is the capstone class of Project Lead The Way (PLTW) curriculum taught in many schools across Indiana, in which students design and develop a project that addresses an open-ended engineering problem. Of all the courses offered in the PLTW curriculum, this has the greatest potential for students to engage in a service-learning project, because the open-ended engineering problem could be used to help the community. A Likert-type survey was sent to the 62 secondary technology education teachers in Indiana who were certified to teach EDD during the 2011-2012 school year to identify the frequency at which the core components of service-learning, as identified by the National Service-Learning Clearinghouse (2006), were being implemented in the EDD curriculum. Fifteen teachers completed the survey by the end of the 2011-2012 academic calendar. Four of the 15 EDD teachers (27%) reported that a majority of their students' projects addressed a need in the community, and therefore were considered to be service-learning projects. The percentage of projects that were called service-learning projects by the respondents appeared to have a direct relationship with the total number of students enrolled in the PLTW program, and an inverse relationship with the number of years the teacher had been teaching technology education. Upon further study, only 2 of these EDD teachers (13%) were guiding students to collaborate with their community partner frequently enough to have an experience indicative of high quality service-learning according to the National Service-Learning Clearinghouse.

Degree

M.S.

Advisors

Rogers, Purdue University.

Subject Area

Industrial arts education|Secondary education|Science education

COinS