Engineering learning communities

Abstract

Learning communities are used widely across the country as a means of increasing retention of first year students at the university level. Living learning communities where students of the same major reside in a common residential hall of university campuses are common in engineering programs around the nation and their results are prevalent in the literature. In fall 2007 West Texas A&M University, a regional institution of 8000 students in the Texas Panhandle, began offering curricular learning communities for first year engineering majors. This type of learning community model enrolls a cohort of students into two or more courses linked by a common theme. The goal of this program was to create a community among the first year engineering students, and instigate study groups early in their academic career which would offer support through the gateway mathematics, science and engineering courses. Engineering learning communities initially were created linking Precalculus and Fundamentals of Engineering or Calculus I and Fundamentals of Engineering for first semester freshman engineering majors. By student request the experiences were expanded in 2010 to a second semester sequence linking Calculus II and Engineering Statics. Propensity score analysis was used to evaluate the impact of the Engineering Learning Communities on first year retention of students in the engineering program and at the university. The method of propensity scores was used to obtain a matched comparison group from historical and concurrently enrolled first year engineering majors. The covariates of interest were: fulltime or part-time status, sex, first generation status, age, ACT composite score, transfer or native student, and socio-economic status. Rate of retention was then compared for those enrolled in the learning community versus the matched control group. First year engineering majors who participated in a learning community were retained in engineering at a rate of 53% in comparison to 46% for those not enrolled in the learning community. Although not statistically significant (p=0.0924), after matching on the propensity score students enrolled in the engineering community were retained in engineering and at the university at a higher rate than those not enrolled in the learning community experience. © American Society for Engineering Education, 2013.