Work to evaluate work-integrated learning experiences (2020), and the EJEE special issue on bridging the gap between engineering education and the world of practice by guest editors Buckley, Trevelyan, and Winberg (2021). What these publications show, among other things, is the wide variety of work-integrated experiences that universities offer. However, to properly study the contribution of internships to student learning and learning outcomes, it is important to understand the different types of internships that are offered. Internships vary greatly in length and can be a mandatory or elective part of the curriculum but also voluntary, either expected or not expected. Some have very clear learning objectives and deliverables whereas others only require the completion of the actual work experience. Shawcross et al. (2014)’s work is based on two-week-long team-based experiences, while at TU Delft internships only occur in the MSc programmes and are usually formally 3 months in length, but in practice, students prefer to extend to 5 to 6 months. Some may even continue within their place of internship to do their master’s thesis work (Kamp & Verdegaal, 2015), and in the USA many students do a summer internship often named coop (different from coop degree courses) as a summer activity. Hence the authors are creating an overview of the work-integrated learning landscape by developing a typology of internship variations by studying the internship possibilities at several engineering programmes in Belgium, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, and the United States. This paper will present the first version of the typology developed. References Saunders-Smits, G. N. 2008. Study of Delft aerospace alumni, Delft University of Technology. Thesis (Ph.D.). Buckley, J., Trevelyan, J., & Winberg, C. (2021). Perspectives on engineering education from the world of practice. European Journal of Engineering Education, 47(1), 1-7. https://doi.org/10.1080/03043797.2021.2000694 Dornan, T., Boshuizen, H., King, N., & Scherpbier, A. (2007, Jan). Experience-based learning: a model linking the processes and outcomes of medical students' workplace learning. Med Educ, 41(1), 84-91. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2929.2006.02652.x Kamp, A. & Verdegaal, F., (2015). How to make an industrial internship an integrated learning experience with rich learning outcomes and spin-offs. 11th International CDIO Conference, Chengdu University of IT, China, http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:75af0464-8429-405b-92ad-6df2f61317d2 Luk, L. Y. Y., & Chan, C. K. Y. (2020). Adaptation and validation of the Work Experience Questionnaire for investigating engineering students' internship experience. Journal of Engineering Education, 109(4), 801-820. https://doi.org/10.1002/jee.20351 Schut, S., Maggio, L. A., Heeneman, S., van Tartwijk, J., van der Vleuten, C., & Driessen, E. (2021, Jan). Where the rubber meets the road - An integrative review of programmatic assessment in health care professions education. Perspect Med Educ, 10(1), 6-13. https://doi.org/10.1007/s40037-020-00625-w Shawcross, J. K., Ruth Brooks, D., Kay, J., & Ridgman, T. W. (2014). Short industrial placements – developing an activity framework to support teaching and learning. Higher Education, Skills and Work-based Learning, 4(3), 256-270. https://doi.org/10.1108/heswbl-06-2014-0019@en

In 2020, a new two-year MSc programme in robotics was launched. Unlike most existing robotics programmes, which approach robotics from a specific discipline, this programme aims to train multi-deployable robot generalists using a cognitive approach (no hardware creation). The field of robotics is multidisciplinary by nature and educating students on how to approach projects with a multidisciplinary mindset is at the forefront of the programme. Hence, at the end of the first year, students are thrust into experiencing the true multi-disciplinarity of the robotics field in a synthesizing, multidisciplinary project-based course. In this 5 EC course, students work together in groups of 5 on an industry-based assignment making a translation of societal issues from different perspectives (human, sustainability, safety, ethics, economic, etc.) into intelligent robot solutions. Each team develops and tests a complete, integrated software package for a complex robot system in a simulated environment and implements it in a real robot at the end of the course. Various robots are used, each related to a different case study which is taken on by multiple teams. Students are supported in their project with workshops and minilectures on transferable skills, systems engineering and the Robot Operating System (ROS). This paper describes the development, implementation, and results of the course over its first three years of running. It will present lessons learned from the perspectives of all parties involved: lecturers, technical staff, industry, and students as well as future plans and recommendations for others looking at creating similar courses.@en

Professional development (PD) is a key element for enhancing the quality of academic teaching. An increasing number of PD activities have moved to blended and online formats, especially since the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to the desire, potential, and need for collaboration among educators to learn from innovative and best practices, several institutions have started to pool their resources and expertise together and have started to implement cross-institutional and cross-national online professional development (OPD). The questions of what type of a (cross-)institutional OPD educators might prefer, and whether educators learn effectively from (and with) peers in such cross-cultural context have not been adequately explored empirically. In this case-study across three European countries, we explored the lived experiences of 86 educators as a result of a cross-institutional OPD. Using a mixed methods design approach our pre-post findings indicated that, on average, participants made substantial gains in knowledge. In addition, several cultural differences were evident in the expectations and lived experiences in ODP, as well as the intention to transfer what had been learned into one's own practice of action. This study indicates that while substantial economic and pedagogical affordances are provided with cross-institutional OPD, cultural differences in context might impact the extent to which educators implement lessons learned from OPD.

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The increasing global demand for robotics expertise led the Delft University of Technology to launch a two-year Master of Science programme in Robotics in 2020. The programme was designed to educate versatile robotics engineers capable of overseeing the entire process from conception of robotics systems to implementation. The curriculum integrates disciplines such as machine perception, artificial intelligence, robot planning and control, human-robot interaction, and ethics, and emphasises personal development through a course called Portfolio, which was later rebranded as Vision and Reflection. The effectiveness of the programme was evaluated by conducting a survey among the first cohort of students. The online survey, completed by 21 alumni, assessed the programme’s alignment with graduates’ career paths and their perceptions of the programme. Most respondents (81%) secured employment, with 69% in robotics, and all others had consciously chosen different fields. On average, graduates found jobs in under a month. Common job titles were Robotics Engineer and Software Engineer. However, graduates least appreciated the original Robot & Society and Portfolio courses. The recently rebranded Vision and Reflection course is expected to improve student engagement by focusing on meaningful reflection rather than documentation. Overall, the programme received positive feedback, with 88% of respondents saying it provided a comprehensive robotics education, and 94% stating they would choose it again. However, the evaluation was limited to the more successful half of the cohort, indicating the need to assess the experiences of the remaining graduates, who took over 2.5 years to complete their degrees.
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Grounding the design of educational interventions and their analysis in theory allows us to understand and interpret results of interventions and advance educational theories. Moreover, building an understanding of which educational theories are used and how they are used can build a consensus among researchers and mature the research in a field. In this paper, we investigate the extent to which educational theories are used to ground the design, analysis, and evaluation of learning activities in engineering education. For this purpose, we developed a coding instrument to determine: (1) which educational theories are expressed in studies investigating learning activities and interventions, and (2) the extent to which these theories inform (a) the design of an intervention and (b) the analysis of that intervention. The instrument was applied to a sample of 12 studies from an existing literature review on collaborative engineering design activities to demonstrate the relevance of the developed framework. Results reveal that most studies refer to educational theory, primarily pedagogical approaches such as project-based learning. Furthermore, half of the time, the design of learning interventions is grounded in theory, however, the evaluation of those interventions is often not connected to educational theories.@en

The amount of literature that focuses on diversity and inclusion within engineering education continues to grow. However, research traditionally focuses on gender, and despite the United Nations Convention for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) being passed in 2016, there is still a lack of work which describes the experience of students with disabilities....
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Increasing student numbers in higher education, particularly in engineering and computer science, make it difficult for motivated lecturers to continue engaging in active teaching methods such as Flipped Classrooms and Work-Based Learning. In these settings, digital Peer Assessment can be one approach to provide effective and scalable feedback. In Peer Assessment, students assess each other’s performance whilst gaining useful reflection and judgment skills at the same time. This umbrella review of 14 review papers on the use of (digital) Peer Assessment in education provides a comprehensive overview of design choices and their consequences open to educational practitioners wishing to implement digital Peer Assessment in their courses, the type of tooling available and the possible effects of these choices on the learning outcomes as well as potential pitfalls and challenges when implementing Peer Assessment. The paper will inform and assist educators in finding or developing a tool that fits their needs.@en

To assist in resolving the perceived lack of transversal competencies (TCs) of engineering graduates by industry, this study investigates the characteristics of transforming an existing industry TC instrument for use in engineering education. The instrument consists of 36 nuanced sub-competencies with the corresponding definitions and descriptive mastery levels. This instrument was first used to determine required TCs mastery levels for BSc and MSc graduates by European industry and subsequently, using two representative curricula as case studies to map TCs course outcomes and lecturer perceptions of TCs course outcomes, using interviews for further exploration. The main findings are that the TC instrument is suitable to determine desired industry mastery levels as well as to map TCs course outcomes both in formal documentation and by lecturers. Also, a gap between the formal and perceived curriculum was found i.e. discrepancies in reported TC learning outcomes between formal documentation and lecturer-reported TCs in courses.

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The gender divide for women in the engineering domain in academia is still very large today, even though most institutions are committed to changing this. Although there are slow improvements in the number of women working in academic positions in Engineering, the Netherlands, in particular, is still lagging badly behind the rest of Europe with women making up only 17.6% of all full professors in the engineering domain and for 25.7% in the entire academic domain. This is despite many efforts across the board to improve this situation. The situation is even worse in the field of Aerospace Engineering and within this field, the lack of progress is not unique to the Netherlands with similar issues being reported in the United States of America and wider afield. This paper reports on research on the capacity building among women required within the aerospace engineering domain to reach the commonly defined critical mass percentage of 30% of women full professors using metrics on career progress and on as well as labour market data on the career development of Aerospace graduates to show where potential new interventions can be made. @en

This workshop is part of the ERASMUS+ project: RAPIDE: on Relevant Assessment and pedagogies for Inclusive Digital Education (https://rapide-project.eu) and is open to anyone who is interested in implementing or improving peer assessment in their courses. At the end of the workshop, participants will be able to make an informed decision on a suitable form of Peer Assessment for their courses. Over the past few years, many of us have faced operating in a frequently changing teaching environment which has made evaluating and assessing students’ learning outcomes and more importantly giving students feedback on their learning much more complicated. One pedagogical tool that has been increasingly used is that of peer assessments where students give each other feedback and assess each other’s work. In this workshop, participants will be introduced to many different types of peer assessment that can be used in engineering education, such as peer reviewing (each other’s work), peer grading(continuous feedback on mastery), and peer evaluation (group work) whether face-to-face, hybrid or in a fully online environment and how to do so in an inclusive way thus maintaining the important safe place that education should be. Participants will then in small groups discuss what types of peer evaluations they use or want to use in their courses and brainstorm on ideas for implementation in their own specific case or for one of the general cases that the facilitators will have available. At the end of the workshop participants will present their main findings back to the whole group so that they may also learn from each other. We aim for participants to leave feeling inspired at the end of the workshop to implement or improve peer assessment in their own courses. The aggregated main findings and ideas contrived in the workshop on how to implement peer assessment will also be shared with a wider audience through the conference proceedings and the RAPIDE project website. @en

The first woman to graduate from our faculty, then known as ‘Vliegtuigbouwkunde’ (Aeronautical engineering) was Koo Siu Ling. She was an international student from Indonesia of Chinese descent. When she registered to study ‘Vliegtuigbouwkunde’, it made the newspapers, both in the Netherlands and in Indonesia. She would start her studies in 1956 at the age of 16.@en

In March 2020 COVID-19 brought the world and with that aviation to a standstill. Also in March 2020, the third run of the DelftX MOOC Introduction to Aerospace Structures and Materials started on edX. This MOOC generally attracts a mixture of young aviation enthusiasts (often students) and aviation professionals. Given the large interest MOOCs have received as the pandemic hit, we investigate how the new global context affected the motivation and the way learners interact with our course material. For this project, we will use learning analytics approaches to analyse the log data available from the edX platform and the data from pre- and post-course evaluations of two runs of the same MOOC (2019 and 2020). With the insights gathered through this analysis, we wish to better understand our learners and adjust the learning design of the course to better suit their needs. Our paper will present the first insights of this analysis.@en

De eerste vrouw die afstudeerde aan onze faculteit – die destijds ‘Vliegtuigbouwkunde’ heette – was Koo Siu Ling. Ze was een buitenlandse student uit Indonesië van Chinese afkomst. Toen ze zich aanmeldde voor de opleiding vliegtuigbouwkunde haalde dat zowel in Nederland als in Indonesië de krant. Ze begon met haar studie in 1956, toen ze 16 jaar was.@en

Recent research by KU Leuven showed that 33% of the engineering graduates in Flanders changed jobs in the first year, with 60% of those citing job content as a reason. Also, industry often reports that recent graduate hires lack the right skills for the job. It appears that students seem to enter the labour market less prepared both in perception and skill level. This study investigates the perceptions of first-year students on their future role and the competencies they need by developing an engineering role model on the business model of Tracey and Wiersema. The premise of the PREFER-model is that most vacancies for junior engineers fall into one of three roles: Product Leadership (i.e., focus on radical innovation), Operational Excellence (i.e., focus on process optimization), and Customer Intimacy (i.e., focus on client-tailored solutions). A survey was administered to first-year students from the three largest engineering degrees in Belgium, Ireland, and the Netherlands. A total of 197 students in Belgium (KU Leuven – Engineering Technology), 89 students in Ireland (TU Dublin – Engineering), and 372 students in the Netherlands (TU Delft – Aerospace Engineering) participated. In this survey, students were also asked to express their preference for three fictional job vacancies reflecting the three different roles. The results showed that first-year students do not have a clear view of the future and have an idealized perception of the engineering profession centred around the Product Leadership role. Students were also found to overestimate their level of preparedness when it comes to their mastery of competencies. It is suggested that having a discerning professional roles model as well as instruments that allow students to assess their role alignment and associated role competencies will help mitigate these issues.

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Although accreditation bodies emphasise communication competencies development in engineering curricula due to its importance for future engineers, the focus is often mainly on oral presentation and written reports. A communication activity was created to practice and reflect on students’ communication competencies including describing information in a short time, listening skills, and ask and respond to questions. This activity was implemented at five different European engineering universities involving 393 students. This study explores the effectiveness of this activity as a case-study of game-based learning to practise and reflect on engineering students’ communication competencies. A mixed-method approach measuring students’ communication performance, their perceived communication competencies, and the benefits of this activity to students was used to explore the game characteristics that make the activity effective. The findings of the scoring rubric and the questionnaire used showed that this activity is effective. Because it is engaging and set by rules, students actively participated during the activity, reflected on their effective and ineffective communication competencies, the existing communication barriers and styles, gained awareness, experienced communication in teams, and cooperated with different people. This study highlights the effectiveness of a small intervention using a proven communication activity, which is freely available as OpenCourseWare through TU Delft for anyone to use.@en

Most studies in engineering education focus on the effectiveness of the teaching interventions and what transversal competencies engineering students gain from those interventions immediately after they take place. This study explores the effectiveness of an existing game-based learning activity and the competency retention of the participating students one year after its implementation. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to nine students who participated in the activity at Delft University of Technology, The Netherlands. The findings showed that students remembered and benefited from the activity. This exploratory study indicated that this activity is valid to retain students transversal competencies because it provides active learning, engagement, rules, risk-taking, cooperation and competition, and it can be plugged-and-played in any engineering context. This study encourages researchers in the field of engineering education to conduct transversal competency retention studies, which are fundamental to understand how the teaching practices shape students’ competencies in the period after their participation.@en

This year, 2020, the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands celebrates its 80th birthday. This paper describes the history of the department since its founding in early 1940, just before the start of World War II in the Netherlands, until present day. The paper will highlight how its research and education developed within the socio-economic context of the Netherlands and the developments in aerospace over the past 80 years.@en

This year, 2020, the Faculty of Aerospace Engineering at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands celebrates its 80th birthday. This paper describes the history of the department since its founding in early 1940, just before the start of World War II in the Netherlands, until present day. The paper will highlight how its research and education developed within the socio-economic context of the Netherlands and the developments in aerospace over the past 80 years.@en

As the field of Engineering Education Research is maturing, more and more literature on Engineering Education is becoming available. Combined with increasing digitization and data analysis possibilities in the area of educational research literature, as well as a trend towards requiring more transparent and reproducible literature studies, researchers are required to adopt new and different approaches towards literature studies and reviews. Some examples of the different types are the systematic review, the critical review and the literature overview. This paper intends to assist engineering education researchers by outlining a typology of different literature review types within the field of engineering education research. This typology is based on an elaborate analysis of published literature studies in 3 leading engineering education journals, the IEEE transactions on education, EJEE and JEE, making use of the SALSA Framework (Search, AppraisaL, Synthesis and Analysis) based on a SCOPUS search. A similar method has previously been successfully employed when creating a literature typology in health research by Booth and Grant in 2009 [1]. The characteristics of each typology will be described and suitable and relevant examples of each typology will be given. The outcomes presented in this paper will provide engineering education researchers with a valuable resource to conduct, inform, interpret and guide literature studies in their field.

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Although aerospace traditionally has always had a multidisciplinary approach to engineering and design, the increasing complexity of aircraft and spacecraft and the rapid digitization within the aerospace industry has led to a large number of related engineering and scientific disciplines such as electrical engineers, computer scientist to work much more directly within the aerospace domain than before. Next to that there is a shortage of highly trained engineers worldwide to meet demand. As a result, there is a clear need to provide basic knowledge to non-aerospace engineers working in the field and to motivate and attract more people to engineering and aerospace in particular. This paper details how the creation of a Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) at an introductory level in Aerospace Structures and Materials provides an efficient and fit-for-purpose tool to achieve both aims. The paper will discuss the course design, the course set up, the course evaluation and how the course fits within the online learning philosophy of Delft University of Technology. It will use learning analytics to analyze our learners and their needs.@en