Electrical Engineering Assessment Report

Electrical Engineering Assessment Report

For 2007/2008 Academic Year

This Annual Assessment report summarizes the assessment activities for the academic year 2007-2008. The new assessment process that was adapted from Spring 2006 continues to be working well. There was 75% and 73% compliance respectively in submission of assessment reports for all undergraduate courses that were taught during Fall 2007 and Spring 2008 semesters. Concerns and action items from the current 2007-2008 academic year assessment process are discussed first in Section 1. Progress on action items from the previous year is summarized in Section 2.

The Electrical Engineering (EE) program had its second site visit in Fall 2007. A summary of one concern and one observation from the draft statement from ABET EAC visit is included in Appendix A along with the reply from School of EECS. A summary of the present BSEE assessment process together with the course assessment template is presented in Appendix B. A flow-chart has been developed for the EE curriculum and is enclosed in Appendix C. This is followed by an itemized review of different assessment measures in Appendices D through H. The appendices provide the details on various assessment measures as well as recommendations from faculty.

The major changes in the EE curriculum in the academic year approved in the current academic year 2007-2008 are summarized first.

1) Our BSEE degree program has a long-standing emphasis on faculty-student interactions. To help ensure that this continues to be the case, we have, formalized a new faculty advisor program to ensure undergraduates engage in broad professional discussions with the faculty. This program was discussed by the entire faculty in an October 2007 meeting where the new advising and mentoring procedures for pre-certification students were considered. In the following faculty meeting at the end of November 2007, a revised advising program was unanimously approved by the faculty to be effective beginning the Fall 2008 semester. This program requires students, beginning as freshmen, meet with a faculty mentor at least four times: 1) at the beginning of the degree program; 2) after one year; 3) at certification; and 4) before beginning technical electives and option courses. Transfer students will see a mentor starting at whatever point they enter the department. Faculty mentors will notify academic advisors when meetings with mentors have taken place. Finally, students will give feedback regarding the quality of mentoring they have received and that information will be compiled and forwarded to the Director. This feedback will be considered in the annual reviews of the faculty.

2) To improve the depth of BSEE program in addressing advanced EE topics, EE Curriculum committee approved a minor change that two out of the four required EE technical electives must be 400-level EE courses. This change is also effective from Fall 2008.The EE curriculum underwent a few changes in the previous year 2006/2007 as noted next:

1) As part of the continuing assessment of EE applications of probability and statistics in BSEE degree program, the EE curriculum was modified as follows: EE faculty changed the probability requirement to be either of Math 360 Probability and Statistics or Math 443 Applied Probability. Math 360 is a junior level Math class that can be taken by the EE students in the second semester of the Junior year, a semester earlier than Math 443 in the old BSEE curriculum. The Math probability course is now followed by two required EE courses that show probability applications. The first required course is an EE special Technical Elective to be chosen from among four EE 400 level courses EE432 (RF Engineering for Telecommunications), EE451 (Digital Communication Systems), EE491 (Performance of Power Systems), and EE496 (Introduction to Semiconductor Device Theory). All these four courses require Math 360 or Math 443 as a prerequisite, and include at least two weeks coverage of probability and statistics applications to an EE problem. Math 360 has also been made a co-requisite for EE341 Signals and Systems, which now includes EE applications of probability concepts. The changes became effective from Fall 2007.

2) In order to address concerns on programming course requirements in the BSEE curriculum, EE faculty approved removal of the two-course sequence, CS121 and CS122, with 8 credits of programming classes. Instead, the EE students will be required to take a 3 credit C programming course CS251 and two credits of a new programming course EE221 Numerical Computing for Engineers that introduces Matlab programming for solving numerical analysis applications in engineering. The changes became effective from Spring 2007. The EE Curriculum Committee (CC) will monitor the effectiveness of the new programming classes on the subsequent EE core classes in the following semesters.

Syllabi for the courses are largely the same as those from last year. The syllabi are available along with the list of approved technical electives, and the area specific assessment plans at the EECS website

http://school.eecs.wsu.edu/Undergraduate/ElectricalEngineering/EESyllabi/The main action item identified by CC for the next academic year is summarized first. Detailed discussion of these action items and the measures and concerns that led to these action items is presented in the first section on assessment activities.

(2008.A1) A complete revisiting of the EE curriculum to develop various special tracks within the EE curriculum such as a system track, a power system track, a microelectronics track and possibly a electro-physics track to better coordinate the required courses and electives within these individual tracks. Accordingly each area faculty have been requested to come up with draft program schedules for the individual tracks. EE curriculum committee will focus on streamlining the requirements and electives from various tracks towards meeting ABET requirements as well as BSEE objectives and outcomes in the next academic year.A summary of the EE curriculum activities in addressing the topics from previous year is presented next:

(2007.A1) Coordination of design topics: Microelectronics faculty recommended better coordination of topics between EE311 and EE352. As noted above, Curriculum committee will revisit the question in the context of multiple EE tracks in the next year.(2007.A2) Coverage and assessment of engineering ethics: EE faculty were encouraged to discuss engineering ethics topics in the EE courses with emphasis in the EE senior elective classes. The new EE requirement that at least two of out of four technical electives must be EE 400-level courses will improve EE students exposure to the coverage of engineering ethics topics in the 400-level courses.(2007.A3) Improve effectiveness of Senior Curricular Debrief session report: Students in the senior design courses EE415 and EE416 are being exposed to the assessment tool, curricular debrief, through exposure to the technique during the regular course offerings. The effectiveness of the curricular debrief report will continue to be monitored.(2007.A4) Coverage of EE applications of probability and statistics in the five EE courses EE341, EE432, EE451, EE491 and EE496: The initial feedback from the students has been positive on the coverage of probability and statistics within the five EE courses. This topic will be assessed through relevant course reports as well as other measures.(2007.A5) Programming skills of EE students who have completed CS251 and EE221: The recent changes to programming requirements appear to have resulted in mixed success. While the new course requirement of CS251 and EE221 appear to have helped improve the retention rate, there is continuing concern among EE faculty that the students are lacking in adequate programming skills. Curriculum committee plans to revisit the question of required programming classes as part of the curriculum revision planned for next year.Table of Contents:

1. Assessment Activities

2. Action Items from last year reportAppendix A. EECS reply to 2007 ABET EAC Draft StatementAppendix B. EE Mission Statement and Assessment Plan

Appendix C. EE Curriculum Flowchart

Appendix D. EE Senior Design Assessment Reports

Appendix E. Systems Area Assessment Summary ReportAppendix F. Microelectronics Area Assessment Summary ReportAppendix G. EE Senior Curricular Debrief Session Report

Appendix I. EE Curriculum Presentation to IAB1. Assessment Activities

All the EE course assessment reports for the 2006-2007 year can be seen from

http://www.eecs.wsu.edu/~schneidj/Assessment/ee.html According to our EE Assessment plan, the key courses that provide significant feedback on many of the BSEE program outcomes A through K are the senior design courses EE 415 and EE 416. These two courses were taught by Profs. Patrick Pedrow and Scott Campbell this academic year. The reports from the Prof. Pedrow are included in Appendix D along with the design course summary report from Prof. Pedrow. The evaluators for the two courses include external industry members who then provide valuable assessment feedback from the industry perspective. In general, the course reports indicate that all the main outcomes assessed by the courses were met in the curriculum. Prof. Pedrow has made several specific recommendations and their main observations are listed first:

2008. 1

Concern: Weak teaming skills

CC Recommendation: CC encourages following up on this topic with the entire EE faculty. CTLT is also helping in this regard. 2008.2

Concern: Qualification of students entering EE415 and EE416.CC Recommendation: CC recently modified the pre-requisites for EE415 to explicitly require all the required 300-level EE courses to be completed before a student can enroll in EE415. We will monitor the effectiveness of the change.2008.3

Concern: Weak programming skillsCC Recommendation: CC plans to revisit the programming requirements in the BSEE curriculum in the next academic year. A topic for discussion is whether to revert to the more rigorous computer science programming classes CS121 and CS122 in the BSEE program.The systems area courses EE221 (Numerical methods), EE 321 (Electrical Circuits II), EE 341 (Signals and Systems), EE 451 (Digital Communication Systems), EE 464 (Digital Signal Processing) and EE 489 (Introduction to Control Systems), are discussed in the systems area report submitted by Prof. Sivakumar Krishnamoorthy in Appendix E. Again, the main recommendations are summarized next.

2008.4

Concern: Inadequate Matlab programming skillsCC Recommendation: CC encourages system faculty to explore the effectiveness of EE221 which has been specifically introduced into the EE curriculum for addressing this concern.2008.5

Concern: Offering of EE441CC Recommendation: CC recommends system faculty to either offer the course in the near future or to drop the course from the catalog.In the area of electrophysics, the individual course reports and the summary can be seen at

http://www.eecs.wsu.edu/~schneidj/Assessment/ee.html

There was no summary report submitted for the electrophysics group. The assessment material related to the microelectronics area can be seen in Appendix F. The assessment reports for the courses EE311 (Electronics), EE476 (Analog Integrated Circuits) and EE477 (Analog Integrated Circuits Laboratory) are available at

http://www.eecs.wsu.edu/~schneidj/Assessment/ee.html

The main recommendations are highlighted below.

2008.6

Concern: Coordination of EE311 and EE352.

CC Recommendation: CC recommends the microelectronics area faculty to discuss the coordination of topics in the two required core courses EE311 and EE352. This will be pursued as part of the curriculum revision planned for next academic year.

In the power systems area, the only available reports are from the power area course EE361 (Electrical Power Systems). Two instructors did not submit assessment reports. Prof. Tomsovic has since left WSU while Prof. Donolo was an adjunct faculty. The following list summarizes the main concern of the power area faculty.

2008.7

Concern: Phasor skills for students entering EE361CC Recommendation: Power area faculty are encouraged to work with instructors of the pre-requisite classes EE261 and EE331 to include a better coverage of phasor problems in those classes.2008.8

Concern: Writing in the Major (M course) requirements for EE362.

CC Recommendation: CC has changed the writing in the major requirement class to EE352 from EE362 effective Fall 2008.Focus group reports used in the previous year assessment process have been replaced by a new assessment tool, Senior Curricular Debrief Session Report, starting this academic year. The Senior Curricular Debrief Session report, administered and prepared by CTLT, serves as a primary metric for the BSEE Program outcomes F, G, H, I and J. This report is presented in Appendix G. The main concerns from the debrief session report are stated below.

2008.9

Concern: Coverage of ethics in EE curriculum.

CC Recommendation: Students note that they cannot recall which EE courses involved discussion of engineering ethics. CC will monitor the coverage of ethics related topics in EE courses as part of the curriculum revision planned for next year.2008. 10Concern: Exposure of curriclular debrief to general EE faculty.CC Recommendation: CC will share the results of curricular debrief report with all EE faculty and encourage similar assessment tools in other EE courses. EE 415 and EE 416 senior design courses have already started in this direction.Presentation slides from EE curriculum presentation to the Industry Advisory Board meeting held in October 2007 are presented in Appendix H.

2008. 11Concern: Project management skills for BSEE graduates: IAB encouraged EE curriculum committee to explore better exposure to engineering project management skills in the BSEE curriculum.

CC Recommendation: The possibility of including additional electives focused on project management skills will be discussed in the curriculum revision exercise planned for next year.

A compilation of assessment activities by CC in evaluating each of the A through K program outcomes is presented next. The recommendations by CC related to each of these outcomes is summarized below. Most of these recommendations are related to one or more of the concerns (2008.1) to (2008.11) as noted below, and they are repeated below for the sake of completeness.

Outcome A: Ability to apply knowledge of mathematics, science and engineering.

1) Power area faculty has approved removing the topic of three phase circuits from EE 261 and EE 262 for a better emphasis on phasor calculations.

2) CC will recommend the microelectronics area faculty to discuss any need for revision of course topics in EE 311. 3) CC will work with the Deans office on possibly strengthening the mathematical skills learned by our students in the basic mathematics classes.

4) CC will monitor the student preparation with respect to Matlab in EE 300-level core courses for the new batch of students who are going through the introductory Matlab programming course EE 221.

Outcome B: Ability to design and conduct experiments as well as analyze and interpret data.1. CC will recommend a broad coordination of design topics in EE curriculum as part of the curriculum revision planned for next year.2. CC will request the system area faculty to monitor any improvement in the data analysis skills of students after completing the new required EE course EE 221 Fundamental of Numerical Computing.

Outcome C: Ability to design a system, component, or process to meet desired needs.

1. Faculty recommendations summarized above indicate concerns from faculty on the coordination of design topics in EE curriculum, even though the outcome measures do not clearly indicate any weakness in this area for the EE students. There were also comments by members of Industry Advisory Board (IAB) on the extent of coverage of design topics in BSEE degree program. Accordingly, CC will monitor the coverage of design topics in the revised EE curriculum to be developed next year.Outcome D: Ability to function on multidisciplinary teams.

1. Presently, our EE senior design teams contain only EE students and computer engineering students. EECS is moving toward more interdisciplinary teams within EECS. Soon the computer science students will participate in a required two sequence senior design program similar to the EE415/416 sequence presently required for all EE and computer engineering students. In addition, EECS students will be able to crossover and participate in either the EE senior design projects or the computer science senior design projects. In addition to this, the Dean of Engineering has endorsed a scheme by which seniors within any engineering school or department can intermingle and join each others design projects. This use of broader spectrum interdisciplinary teams is encouraged by CC; however, all ABET outcomes must continue to be assessed properly.

2. To strengthen our students experience in the teaming environment, teaming skills should be introduced early in the curriculum and reinforced at each level throughout the EECS curriculum. Teaming skills include effective communication with spoken and written English. EECS should measure student proficiency with spoken and written English, especially when English is the students second language. In some cases an accent reduction class or equivalent should be required of some students before they enter the EE415/416 sequence. CC should ask one of the design instructors, Scott Campbell, to make a DVD presentation that can be shown to EE415/416 classes. The focus would be on teaming skills, team dynamics, and efficient techniques for engineering teams. The material would be a mix of textbook theory and personal observations from teaching EE415/416. A team of former students could be invited to participate. By having the information on DVD the burden for presenting the material every semester would be lessened. Industry Advisory Board members should also be surveyed regarding successful seminar series that are used to train their employees on modern engineering teaming skills.

2008.12

Concern: Interdisciplinary engineering design courses.

CC Recommendation: CC will work with the Deans office in the development of interdepartmental engineering design classes as well as Computer Science design classes as alternates to the EE design courses.