Synopsis
The NSF Engineering Directorate (ENG) has launched a multi-year initiative, the Skilled Formation of Engineers, to create and help an progressive and inclusive engineering occupation for the twenty first century. Skilled Formation of Engineers (PFE) refers back to the formal and casual processes and worth methods by which individuals turn into engineers. It additionally contains the moral duty of practising engineers to maintain and develop the occupation as a way to enhance high quality of life for all peoples. The engineering occupation should be attentive to nationwide priorities, grand challenges, and dynamic workforce wants; it should be equally open and accessible to all.
Skilled Formation of Engineers contains, however just isn’t restricted, to:
Introductions to the occupation at any age;
Improvement of deep technical {and professional} abilities, information, and skills in each formal and casual settings/domains;
Improvement of outlooks, views, methods of considering, figuring out, and doing;
Improvement of id as an engineer and its intersection with different identities; and
Acculturation to the occupation, its requirements, and norms.
The purpose of the Analysis within the Formation of Engineers (RFE) program is to advance our understanding {of professional} formation. It seeks each to deepen our basic understanding of the underlying processes and mechanisms that help skilled formation and to reveal how skilled formation is or may be completed. Finally RFE goals to rework the engineer-formation system, and thus the affect of proposed initiatives on this method should be described. Principal Investigators (PIs) ought to present a roadmap detailing how they envision the proposed analysis will finally broadly affect apply throughout the engineer-formation system, even when these actions are usually not throughout the scope of the submitted proposal.
With the intention to accomplish its objectives, RFE welcomes proposals in two classes: Analysis Initiatives, and Design and Improvement Initiatives. Analysis Initiatives handle basic questions {of professional} formation, whereas Design and Improvement Initiatives present new approaches to attaining skilled formation. Further particulars are offered beneath. Initiatives in each classes ought to handle the iterative cycle wherein analysis questions that advance understanding are knowledgeable by apply and the outcomes of analysis are, in flip, translated into apply. In different phrases, proposals ought to clarify how the analysis outcomes will journey, translate, switch, or scale. Profitable initiatives determine particular goal audiences, efficient communication channels, and novel partnerships to make sure efficient propagation and scaling. Proposal titles ought to start with both “Analysis:” or “Design and Improvement:” as acceptable.
Analysis Initiatives
Analysis proposals are notably welcome within the following areas:
Analysis that addresses lifelong studying by the engineering workforce.
Analysis on the affect of engineering training analysis. Proposals addressing this matter might examine questions similar to: How can we measure the impacts of engineering training analysis? What are efficient methods for scaling reforms? How can we translate information from analysis to apply? What are the roles of applied sciences, networks and communities in attaining affect? RFE doesn’t help efficacy, effectiveness, or scale-up research for particular interventions.
Analysis that addresses tradition change in engineering training. Included on this matter are investigations of normative cultures of engineering at any stage within the engineering training ecosystem and the way these cultures might drawback sure teams.
Analysis that addresses engineering formation on the two-year school stage in each formal and casual settings.
Analysis that addresses engineering formation on the graduate training stage in each formal and casual settings.
Analysis that investigates engineering in P-12 settings. Analysis on this space might embody understanding of approaches to engineering in P-12, methods to develop engineering methods of considering, or the connection between practices throughout the sciences and arithmetic and engineering considering.
Analysis on the transitions between training ranges, e.g., from highschool to two-year school, highschool to four-year school/college, two-year school to four-year school/college, undergraduate to graduate college, training settings to the workforce or professoriate, and many others.
Analysis that addresses the connection between engineering and the general public. Proposals addressing this matter might think about the social affect of engineering options, citizen engineering, training of an knowledgeable public, and many others.
Analysis that develops or adapts novel methodologies and frameworks acceptable for learning the skilled formation of engineers, and particularly minoritized, marginalized, or underserved populations.
Analysis that addresses methods wherein new applied sciences (similar to synthetic intelligence and machine studying) are altering engineering training.
Analysis to rework engineering training so that each one college students encounter environmental and social sustainability ideas as an built-in a part of their training and are outfitted with the instruments wanted to include these ideas into their future analysis, careers, and improvements.
Proposals submitted to the Analysis Initiatives class ought to have clear analysis questions knowledgeable by an acceptable theoretical framework and a analysis design that features sampling, knowledge assortment, and knowledge evaluation strategies. This class is not going to help proposals that search funding primarily to develop instruments, curriculum, or laboratories, or that search to implement classroom improvements which have already been proven to be efficient in engineering. This system will consider the worth of proposals by contemplating the affect and the price. Analysis monitor initiatives which can be small, exploratory, or speculative are particularly inspired. Bigger Analysis monitor initiatives ought to have a correspondingly bigger affect.
Design and Improvement Initiatives
RFE helps Design and Improvement initiatives (see https://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=nsf13126) that search to develop and check new approaches within the following areas associated to engineering training:
Graduate training.
Undergraduate training in new engineering applied sciences and environmental sustainability.
Transitions between training ranges, for instance highschool to two-year school, highschool to four-year school/college, two-year school to four-year school/college, undergraduate to graduate college, training settings to the workforce or professoriate, and many others.
P-12, particularly approaches to develop engineering considering, or offering hyperlinks between engineering, science, and arithmetic.
Proposals on this class ought to suggest the design and improvement of latest approaches which can be knowledgeable by current literature and idea. There ought to be clear targets and the analysis plan ought to be designed to find out if these targets have been met. Initiatives can’t be solely demonstration initiatives however should add to the engineering training literature to tell future work.
