Assessing the impacts of online design collaboration in developing global competence among undergraduate engineering students who participate from multiple countries

Globalization continues to change the world, and its influence is becoming more and more apparent in our economy, political affairs, scientific discoveries, entertainment, and many other aspects of our life.  In the 1990s, the impact of globalization became a central discussion topic in the professional engineering community (Lohmann, 2006).  In addition to a transnational manufacturing system and outsourcing of engineers from foreign countries, many companies design and produce their products with a multi-national market in mind.  Furthermore, an international acquisition of a company is no longer a rare occurrence.  As a result, more engineers are required to work with, manage, or be supervised by people from different countries.  To be competitive in this global engineering environment, engineers must develop abilities to produce a high quality product while working in a global team (Grandin, 2006, Downey et al, 2006, Parkinson, 2009).

To prepare future engineers for the global working environment, a summit sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) on global engineering education asked educational institutions to recognize global competency as one of the highest priorities in their engineering education and to design a curriculum that facilitates the development of the competency among all students (Parkinson et al., 2009).  To take the challenge, several universities across the U.S. established a program that intended to help their students to develop the global competency (e.g., University of Rhode Island, Lehigh University, MIT, Iowa State University, University of Michigan, Georgia Institute of Technology etc.).  In addition to the course work on global topics, such as international relations, world history, global economy, and cultural anthropology, these programs often involve a study abroad program or global internship (Grudzinski-Hall et al, 2007).  Although these international experiences are still considered a golden standard, cost and resource requirements make it hard for many students to actually participate.

To make the global work/collaboration experience more accessible to more students, the Mechanical Engineering department at Brigham Young University is exploring an online alternative.  Using the research funding from NSF, the ME (Mechanical Engineering) 471 course was design to teach students how to design a product using Computer Assisted Design (CAD) software. What is unique about this course is the global participation of university students located at Canada, Mexico, and Brazil. These international students attend lectures using a video conferencing technology and take quizzes and examinations online. Students are divided into smaller groups. Each group has students from different countries, and they are required to use online communication technology to collaborate on all of their design assignments.

Considering the complexity of the global competence, it is not reasonable to expect a result of one course will provide experiences necessary to develop all of the needed competencies. Thus, the purpose of this study is to create assessment tools and methods that measure the global competence developed as a result of the online design collaboration. The result can be then used to answer the following related questions:

1. What is the best way to measure the effectiveness of online design collaboration in developing global competence among college students?
2. What kind of the global competency can be developed through online design collaboration?

Project Manager Interview

While deciding who to interview for the project manager interview assignment, I wasn't thinking about Steve. However, as I was talking to him about his previous employment one day, it became apparent that he is an excellent choice for the interview. I asked him if I could interview him for the assignment, and he graciously accepted my favor.

Steve worked for a computer equipment company as a director of Client Services, being responsible for all customers in North America. While working this capacity, he has managed numerous projects, and I was really impressed by his management style and philosophy.

Instead of asking his failed project experiences, I asked him the five principles that he has learned which helped him prevent failing his projects. Here is the summary of what he told me.

Lesson 1: Organize a good team

I think this is the simplest, yet the most important (and perhaps the most difficult) aspect of project management. When we have a competent team that is responsible, trustworthy, hard working, and knows how to work within a team, it is highly unlikely that the team will fail their projects. Of course, they might still fail once in a while due to the factors beyond their control; however, a good project team will work even harder to complete their projects despite the kind of negative factors that work against them.

Lesson 2: Use delegation as a way to facilitate a feeling of team ownership

A project manager might decide to delegate some of his or her responsibilities to team members, simply because he or she is too busy. Steve told me that this kind of delegation is not effective, and it might increase team frustration. He said that we need to use delegation as a way to facilitate a feeling of ownership among the team members. When a whole team feel that a project truly belongs to them, they will focus more on their project, and it will ensure an effective and efficient completion of the project.

Lesson 3: Know your team

Knowing a team means to have a clear understanding of each team member's job skills, competency, and working styles. Having this knowledge will help a project manager create a realistic project task schedule and how to deal with unexpected issues that might arise during the life-cycle of the project.

Lesson 4: Train and compensate their growth

Since we might not always find a perfect person for every position we need for completing a project, training is a key part of project management. And when a person gain new skills for his or her project, their efforts need to be compensated in some way.

Lesson 5: Expect Changes


In managing projects, changes are inevitable. A team member might decide to leave a company while the project is still going. We need to keep our positive thinking. Deal with changes with optimism. At the end, everything will work out fine as long as we exercise our faith in God.

Project Management Report

I guess I could wrote what I thought about what I have read, but I think for those of you who are reading this post, it might be beneficial to give you a summary or highlighted quote of what I have read. That way, you don't need to read those articles, but you can get some ideas of what they are about. So, enjoy!

Project Communication:
Link

This article talks about how external stakeholders (e.g., sponsor, customer and resource manager) must be continually informed of a progress. Also their inputs need to be consistently recorded as well. It also suggested that we need to actively managing the stakeholders expectations, not just reporting details of the project.

Key Questions

1. Who needs information, why, and when?
2. What type of information will they need and in what detail?
3. What will you goal be when you communicate with customer and management and what medium will best accomplish that?
   

Scope Creep:
Link

Typical Reasons for Scope Creep

1. Insufficient Requirements Analysis Definition resulting in business requirements that are not well defined.
2. Underestimating the complexity of the problem in an unknown industry.
3. Management failure in managing user expectations.
4. Involving the users only in later stages of project life cycle such as programming and testing.

 Suggested Solutions

1. Define the business requirements as “must-haves” and “nice to haves” and prioritize them. Identify the risks for each “must-have” requirement and get the stakeholders approval. Plan these prioritized requirements in the form of phased deliverable during the project life cycle.
2. Set project expectations with the customer stakeholders and get the buy in from the customer.
3. Decide and document the agreed project deliverables in the Statement Of Work (SOW) document and requirement areas that are NOT included.
4. Document requirements and review with the customers before any sign off.
5. Decide and document how the users will use the system in the form of test cases during the requirement analysis phase.
6. Make a flexible project plan allowing users to participate at the design phase and incorporate their suggestions. In case scope creep cannot be avoided, participate in re-scoping. 
7. Do an impact analysis and attach a cost and time for the new requirements (effective in getting the sponsor to re-validate the new requirements).
   
8. Introduce a formal change management process that would allow the users to define the requests as “Your Enhancement Submission” (YES) form. Follow the six steps for any changes or deviations from the initial set of requirements: 1. Record 2. Assess 3. Plan 4. Build 5. Implement 6. Close.

Change Management:
Link

According to this article, Change Management is "processes, tools and techniques to manage the people-side of change to achieve the required business outcome." It incorporates "the organizational tools that can be utilized to help individuals make successful personal transitions resulting in the adoption and realization of change."

Three steps of Change Management are:

• Planning for change
• Managing change
• Reinforcing change

And when we manage changes, focus on:

• Individual Reactions
  
• Communications
• Sponsorship
• Coaching
• Training
• Resistance Management

This articles also talk about the differences between Project Management and Change Management. I'm not that impressed by the comparison, but it is informative.


Schedule Management:
Link

10 steps (Or things to remember?) that will help us analyze the general contractor's project schedule, plan your work, and negotiate for better scheduling:

1. Scope letter: Add the following clause to your terms and conditions: “Price is based on having a reasonably leveled schedule.” This clause will lay the groundwork for you to negotiate on the project schedule as described below.
2. Your tasks: Begin developing a worksheet to analyze the project schedule as provided by the general contractor. Pull all items referring to your work out of the schedule. Use the item numbers from the project schedule so you have a common point of reference when negotiating (click here to see Table 1).
3. Details: Make notes of duration, start, and finish dates as shown on the project schedule.
4. Accuracy: Make sure that at least every piece of your WBS is represented. Having a standardized WBS for your project will make doing this analysis even easier. Often, there are activities that will be left out, or there will be minor things you'll have to do as part of another piece of work — such as during a concrete pour. You want to make sure your list is thorough. Add items in where they will need to be inserted back into the project schedule. The example shown in the table is 33-A, B, C, and D, which breaks down the electrical rough stage of work into more detail.
5. Logic: Check to see that the logic is correct, and you'll be able to proceed with your work efficiently. Frequently, the logic won't be correct, activities won't be completed, or other activities are scheduled to start while you are still in the area. Having a standard WBS that details exactly what you need to have done to perform your work efficiently will make this part of the analysis much easier.
6. Man-hours: Add in the estimated man-hours for each task. The schedule will likely be in more detail and organized differently than your budget is. This is why it's important to understand the details behind the budget, so that the man-hours can be reorganized to roughly match the schedule tasks.
7. Resource loading: Lay out tasks with resources required over time. This can be done with pencil (make sure and use one with an eraser!), with Excel (click here to see Table 2), or — if you have the skills and the time — with scheduling software. Start by determining the average resources you'll need for each activity [hours ÷ duration ÷ 8 hours = average resources]. After that, fill in the time line as shown in Table 2.
8. Total resources: You need to determine the total resources required for all tasks. This will show you what your manpower requirements look like over the course of the job. This can be done on a more expanded spreadsheet similar to the one shown in Table 2.
9. Leveling opportunities: This is where the work really begins. Start looking for ways to level out your manpower. Some areas to look at include:

• Can you load resources across the task differently?
• Is there any way to start the task earlier?
• Can you use float in activity to extend duration?
• Can a successor task start prior to you finishing 100%?
• Can you do pre-fabrication work in periods of low resource requirements?

      10. Only request that the duration of the project be extended as a last resort.

• The letter: Gather all of the notes you made as you were going through the steps above, and create a letter detailing your requests. Some ideas for the wording in your letter are as follows:
• Intro: Our proposal was based on having a “reasonably leveled” schedule. This schedule currently requires excessive fluctuations in our manpower that will result in inefficiencies, thereby delaying completion of the project. Please review the following recommendation.
• New task required: We need two days to run raceway on the metal deck before the concrete pour starts. We should be able to accomplish this task without extending the schedule. We request that you expand the decking/concrete pour tasks to reflect the individual floors so this task can be entered without affecting the completion date of the schedule.
• Logic/detail: The electrical rough (33) is shown, starting with the framing. This will not allow for an efficient installation. We need to have an entire area — at least equal to half of a floor — completely framed before we start our rough. Please expand the schedule to reflect the additional detail. Overall duration for electrical rough is acceptable.

Project Budget

This is my first and rough budget breakdown. For now, all I know is that I need people who can help organize a curriculum of the program and create about 20 online courses in two years. I also need people to help with enrollment process and people who will mentor/grade students once the program starts. Please note that I’m planning to cap the enrollment number to 100 students for the first two years. Then the program goes well, we can gradually increase the enrollment size and eventually to complete open enrollment.

Budget for the first two years

• Project Director (1 Full-Time) $75,000
• Sr. Instructional Designer (2 Full-Time) $65,000 x 2 = $130,000
• Jr. Instructional Designer (6 Part-Time) $18,720 x 6 = $112,320
• Student Mentor/Grader (6 Part-Time) $18,720 x 6 = $112,320 (*16 students per mentor)
• Enrollment Manager (1 Full-Time) $55,000
• Enrollment Assistant (1 Part-Time) $15,600

Yearly Salary Total: $499,920 * 2 = $999,840

I probably need to budget for software, computer, server, benefits cost for the full-time employees, building fees, etc…, but I don’t exactly know how much these items cost. So, for now, I will not include the breakdown of the cost. Also, we are charging tuition for the students who want to enroll to the program. That will give us:

Student Tuition $2,700 * 100 = $270,000 a year, and in two years = $540,000

So, just looking at salary (which I believe where the majority of the expenses go), I need to request someone to fund us bout $459,840 in two years. But, of course, there are other expenses that I didn’t include, so let’s say we ask $1,000,000 for the first two years.

Thoughts on maintenance

Now good news is that once we complete all courses and standardize our enrollment process, we can increase our enrollment number. So, if we have 300 people enroll to the program:

Student Tuition $2,700 * 300 = $810,000 a year

And I believe the maintenance team budge for 300 students will look like this:

• Project Director (1 Full-Time) $75,000
• Sr. Instructional Designer (1 Full-Time) $65,000
• Jr. Instructional Designer (3 Part-Time) $18,720 x 5 = $56,160
• Student Mentor/Grader (18 Part-Time) $18,720 x 18 = $336,960 (*16 students per mentor)
• Enrollment Manager (1 Full-Time) $55,000
• Enrollment Assistant (4 Part-Time) $15,600 * 4 = $62,400

Yearly Salary Total: $650,520

That means that we have $810,000 from tuition and it cost $650,520 to maintain the program, so we will have $159,480 as a leftover!

Well, this is a really optimistic calculation, but I’m pretty sure that as we increase the number of enrollment, we will become more capable of sustaining the program without relying on external funds! (And I hope I’m right about this…, and I really think paying $2,700 a year for a master's degree from BYU is a way way waaaaaaaaaay and supeeeeeeeer deal.)

Project Timeline

• (September, 2010) Form the IP&T open master’s program initiative committee.
• (October, 2010) Define the program’s learning objectives and outcomes.
• (November, 2010) Create the program requirement document.
• (November, 2010) Identify the courses necessary for the program.
• (December, 2010) Organize/hire the program development team.
• (December, 2010) Create a plan for the online learning/teaching infrastructure and environment.
• (January, 2011) Train the development team.
• (January, 2011) Start to develop the first year course materials.
• (January, 2011) Create a plan for the 1st year project execution and identify the hiring process.
• (February, 2011) Start marketing the program.
• (April, 2011) Hire the execution team.
• (May, 2011) Train the execution team.
• (June, 2011) Start the enrollment process for the first year (Enrollment Cap: 100).
• (September, 2011) Start the 1st year of the program.
• (September, 2011) Start to develop the 2nd year course materials.
• (September, 2011) Evaluate execution process and write grant proposal for the year 2013 and 2014.
• (September, 2012) Start the 2nd year of the program.

BYU’s IP&T program goes open and beyond

Okay, it’s been frustrating and challenging weeks for me to decide the exact project I would like to propose. To tell you the truth, I don’t really know yet. So, I decided to pick a project that is not realistic in actuality (I would say it won’t happen for while or at least not easily), yet really exciting to me. My proposal is to get a grant to make our IP&T master’s program open and online degree-offering program.

Let me explain more.

Making our master’s program open means the following:

1. We create an online-based master’s degree program.
2. We will develop instructional materials for all of our master’s courses and share them to the public via the Internet (lecture videos, lecture slides, syllabus etc.).
3. Eventually, we will make the master’s program OPEN ENROLLMENT (yes, we will not reject anyone. Everyone is accepted and get their degrees as long as they can meet the degree requirements).
4. We will reduce a tuition fee by 75% of current non-BYU student tuition rate (So, financially more accessible for student), but we will not sacrifice the quality of the program.
   

Now, I know this is a challenging project, but I guess that’s why it’s perfect for this class assignment (and beyond, in my option). So, let us not worry about if BYU allows this initiative or any other possible obstacles. I’m doing this JUST for this class. However, I am committed to make this proposal as realistic as possible and if BYU ever allows, then we can say that we already have a pretty solid plan. Well, enough said, I’m now working on the project outline and budgets.



Please wait for the update...

Introduction

Well, for some reasons, I struggled in this assignment. I still don't like this intro, but I have to put up something.... So, this is what I have so far.

Isaku

"Open Educational Resources (OER) are one of the promising educational phenomena that could alter our current educational models and practices. For centuries, many educational institutions have practiced the closed or constrained system of education. Excluding a few exceptions, those organizations put intellectual, geographical, financial, and admission-related constraints on people if they desire to access their education.

OER could provide a way to remove these constraints, allowing any organizations or individuals to access, use, and reuse teaching and learning materials at no cost. The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation (n.d.) states “At the heart of the movement toward Open Educational Resources is the simple and powerful idea that the world’s knowledge is a public good and that technology in general and the Worldwide Web in particular provide an extraordinary opportunity for everyone to share, use, and re-use knowledge.”

Perhaps the most famous example of OER is the OpenCourseWare (OCW) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). In 2002, MIT launched their OCW and started to share course syllabus, lecture notes, PowerPoint presentations, recorded lectures, and other instructional materials over the Internet. By late 2007, MIT published over 1,800 courses from 33 academic fields, almost the entire curriculum of MIT.

Other universities followed the MIT’s OCW initiative, and the OER movement gained more attention; however none of these initiatives was intended to be a degree- or certificate-granting program. In contrast, a few scholars (Wiley, 2009, Smith & Casserly, 2006) and people argue that OER should be used as a part of programs that offers educational degrees and certifications. Currently, there are a few institutions that offer open and free educational program developed from OERs.

Although this open and cost-free aspect of the open educational program (OEP) might be initially appealing to some, the critical question still need to be answered to prove their creditability; how do they create and maintain an educational program that useful, meaningful, and creditable when financial and educational resources are limited? Good educational program requires much more than organizing courses and course materials. It requires experienced teachers or mentors that can monitor and assist the learning progress of the students, the trustworthy assessment system that can demonstrate competitive learning achievement of the students, and a strong administrative infrastructure that can support and maintain the institution and its growth. In order to prove the creditability of the program, any OEP needs to meet these requirements."