August 2006

Welcome to the August issue of Connections, the American Society for Engineering Education's free e-newsletter.

Spotlight On Our Sponsors:

• LabVIEW 8.20 – 20th Anniversary Edition
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• FREE 5 year licence for Synplicity®’s FPGA synthesis
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LabVIEW 8.20 – 20th Anniversary Edition

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Welcome to the World of K–12 Engineering!

Introducing engineering into the K–12 classroom connects science and math concepts to the everyday engineering that surrounds us. TeachEngineering.com helps teachers enhance learning, excite students and stimulate interest in science and math through the use of hands–on engineering. With a fully searchable, digital library of standards–based lesson plans, and a myriad of “Living Laboratories” that bring real–world engineering principles into the classroom, TeachEngineering's comprehensive curricula are hands–on, inexpensive, and relevant to children's daily lives.

TeachEngineering.com is a joint effort of the University of Colorado, Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Colorado School of Mines, Duke University, Oregon State University, and the American Society for Engineering Education, and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation.

Bring the world of engineering into the K–12 classroom with TeachEngineering.com. You don’t need knowledge of engineering to use these curricula!

Search TeachEngineering.com’s digital library at
www.teachengineering.com.

New and Improved Journal of Engineering Education!

The Journal of Engineering Education is a peer-reviewed international journal published quarterly by the American Society for Engineering Education. It serves as an archival record of the leading scholarly research in engineering education. Visit www.asee.org/about/publications/jee/ to read it online.

In this Issue:

I. Databytes

• Number of Teaching Personnel by School
• Women Tenured/Tenure Track Teaching Faculty Members by School
• African-American Tenured/Tenure Track Teaching Faculty Members by School
• Asian Tenured/Tenure Track Teaching Faculty Members by School
• Hispanic Tenured/Tenure Track Teaching Faculty Members by School

II. Congressional Hotline

• Congress Needs Better Scientific Advice, Witnesses Say
• Senate to Delay Vote on Appropriations Bills

III. Teaching Toolbox

• Hi-Tech Textbooks - E-books are on the rise in some classrooms, but the publishing industry is still getting the kinks out.

IV. Fellowship Programs

• The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) Postdoctoral Fellowship Program
• The Air Force Summer Faculty Fellowship Program (SFFP)

V. Professional Opportunities

• Mechanical Engineering Technology Instructor/Assistant Professor St. Louis Community College at Florissant Valley
   

I. Databytes

 Back to the index.

II. Congressional Hotline

Congress Needs Better Scientific Advice, Witnesses Say

The House Committee on Science heard on July 25 from a panel of expert witnesses, all of whom agreed that there is a gap in the type of science and technology (S&T) advice that Congress currently receives. Rep. Rush Holt (D-N.J.), who testified at the hearing, argued that, “We do not suffer from a lack of information here on Capitol Hill, but from a lack of ability to glean the knowledge and gauge the validity, credibility, and usefulness of the large amounts of information and advice received on a daily basis."  Dr. Catherine Hunt, president-elect of the American Chemical Society, suggested, “Congress should consider establishing an in-house science and technology unit that supplements their capabilities and provides timely, thorough assessments for decisions on issues involving a wide range of science, engineering, and technology.”  She continued, “This unit could be housed in CRS [Congressional Research Service], GAO [Government Accountability Office], or stand alone as a congressional support agency.”   

For more information, visit: http://www.house.gov/science/press/109/109-300.htm

Senate to Delay Vote on Appropriations Bills

An article in the July 19^th edition of The Wall Street Journal explains how Senate Republicans are waiting until after the November elections to vote on many of the FY 2007 spending bills.  The spending bills will most likely cut billions of dollars from the President’s defense request to pay for domestic priorities.  “This strategy has two purposes- shielding vulnerable Republican senators from having to cast difficult votes on domestic spending and keeping the focus on national security and the ‘American values’ agenda, where the majority feels it is strongest,” the article said.  The House of Representatives, on the other hand, has managed to pass all but one spending bill (the Labor/Health and Human Services/Education Bill, H.R. 5221). 

 Back to the index.

III. Teaching Toolbox

Hi-Tech Textbooks

There may be a lot of buzz about electronic books, but professors, publishers and bookstores say digital tomes are far from the norm. Some professors are using e-books in their engineering classes and laboratories, but the number is small and varies from campus to campus. Many of their colleagues and publishers are taking a more wait-and-see attitude while the industry gets the bugs out.

The first of those bugs is content. E-books are read or downloaded from a Web site. Students can pay for the e-book at the Web site or buy it through an online retailer or a traditional brick-and-mortar bookstore. What students actually buy is an access code to the online version. For an additional fee, students may also be able to buy a CD-ROM or DVD version. However, the CD may only have an abridged version of the textbook, forcing students to buy a printed copy if they want to use it for reference at a later date.

Access is also an issue, as e-books are available only with a computer. Frequently, there are licensing restrictions on how the online version can be printed. Once a course is over, access to the online content may expire. Also, the content may be available only through the specific computer that registered with the Web site. Portability could be another bug because students must have access to a computer to be able to study.

E-books are not very common in engineering education, says Prasad Enjeti, the Texas Instruments Professor in the department of electrical engineering at Texas A&M University in College Station. In one of his undergraduate classes, Enjeti uses an e-book that's available at no charge through the university's library. "I think our younger generation will easily adopt the e-book concept," he says, especially with hand-held readers.

"Of course, (e-books) are the wave of the future," says Alfred Carlson, a professor of chemical engineering at Rose- Hulman Institute of Technology in Terre Haute, Ind. "There are just too many advantages, especially cost, to having e-books available." Carlson, who says he would use e-books in his classes if they were available, says the benefits are huge. "Students can carry all of their 'books' around with them at all times, can search the material more easily, can move through the material using different patterns and, of course, the material should be cheaper," Carlson says. "Another major advantage is publication speed and relevance. Most thermo books either have no new info or outdated or useless material. There are way too many of these books and too few books on special topics."

Access is not a problem, Carlson says, because "everyone has a computer. Look around your office. Only Third World countries do not all have the technology, and this is changing rapidly. No one can keep up without the technology. This is a nonargument."

At least one professor has done away with the expense of buying access or the book by offering his textbook on heat transfer as a free download to anyone, anywhere. John H. Lienhard V, a professor of mechanical engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, decided to offer "A Heat Transfer Textbook" in a PDF format at no charge. The book has been downloaded thousands of times, as evidenced by the thank-you's Lienhard has received from students all over the world — from the United States to India to Colombia.

After 20 years and three editions, the publisher decided to stop printing the book, and the copyright reverted to Lienhard and his father and co-author, John H. Lienhard IV. Driven by a sense of altruism, the Lienhards put the book online. What cost $150 before is now free. And the online version is in a format that allows easy updates and changes. "The advantage is definitely with the author, who can turn around to his computer and fix it and instantly put the new version online," Lienhard says.

Work in Progress

Despite the ease and reduced expense, acceptance of electronic books has been slow. "There's been a lot of media attention to e-books and students thinking they are a cost-effective alternative, but we are not seeing sales or adoption by faculty," says Laura Nakoneczny, director of public relations at the National Association of College Stores in Oberlin, Ohio.

Not all e-books are equal, and there's a struggle between content owners and publishers over what the best model for distribution is, Nakoneczny says. A soon-to-end pilot project on e-book sales at college bookstores may answer some of those questions.

A group of publishers has teamed with distributor MBS Textbook Exchange Inc., in Columbia, Mo., to sell access to digital textbooks for one-third the price of the printed versions. The goal is to assess the market demand, and if the pilot project is successful, similar programs will be rolled out to all of MBS' bookstore clients. Among the 10 schools participating in the project are California State University at Fullerton, West Virginia University and the University of Oregon.

Chris Standish, book distribution manager at the University of Oregon bookstore, says although buying e-books might feel like a gamble because they're so new, he's confident users will like them for their convenience.

But Standish says, at least at the beginning, price will be a big issue. Standish suspects the trial's one-third price discount might not be low enough. "I think to get people to try stuff, you have to make it a really good deal."

Already, the project has had to extend access to the e-books from the five months originally planned to at least a year because of student complaints. Truncated access riles more than students. "E-book content may be turned off, either by a new edition that may discontinue coverage of an outdated topic or through licensing restrictions," says Barrett S. Caldwell, an associate professor of industrial engineering and director of the Indiana Space Grant Consortium at Purdue University. "That's a real problem since I refer to old content in a variety of ways, even after years or decades. I have trouble with publishers forcing people to pay for content and then cutting off access. For engineers, old textbooks are important references to refresh knowledge." Both of the texts Caldwell uses in his engineering statistics classes this semester have e-book capabilities.

"There is a trend toward e-book publishing on the part of the publishers, who are trying to evolve their formats to accommodate purchaser and user needs and desires," says Susan Spilka, director of corporate communications at John Wiley & Sons Inc., in Hoboken, N.J. "The trend, however, has not as yet reflected itself in dramatic increases in e-book sales for scientific and technical books, other than by libraries."

But Pam Goodman, a spokeswoman for Follett Corp., which owns or operates 720 bookstores in the United States and Canada, says they're on the upswing. "We've not seen a lot of tracks yet with e-books, although they are a growing mechanism for providing course content to students." Still, she says, Follett recently developed a new corporate group to explore e-books along with other electronic formats, such as electronic or digital libraries.

"In the last few years, people have been more sensible about what e-books can and can't do, and there's less overglamorizing," says David Blakesley, an associate professor of English and director of the professional writing program at Purdue. Blakesley also owns Parlor Press LLC, which publishes e-books. With e-books, students can search and highlight material, write in the margins and even turn down the corner of a page. E-books mix video and interactive elements that allow everything from visual demonstration of laboratory experiments to quizzes. "They definitely are different than paper books, and each has its advantages," Blakesley says. "E-books are here to stay."

Back to the index.

IV. Fellowship Programs

The Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) Postdoctoral Fellowship Program

Opportunities at NRL are open to citizens of the United States and to legal permanent residents.  All permanent residents applying to the NRL program must have their green card at the time of application. If you hold another citizenship in addition to that of the United States, you will need to provide the following:  a statement expressing your willingness to renounce your (dual) citizenship; and be willing to return your foreign passport to the embassy, providing a receipt or you may destroy the passport in the presence of a security official. There is a competitive stipend as well as insurance, relocation, and travel allowances for Fellows.  This program offers one to three year postdoctoral fellowships designed to increase the involvement of scientists and engineers from academia and industry to scientific and technical areas of interest and relevance to the Navy.  This program has a rolling admission.  Go to: http://www.asee.org/nrl to learn more about the program.

Back to the index.

V. Professional Opportunities

Mechanical Engineering Technology Instructor/Assistant Professor St. Louis Community College at Florissant Valley

Requires Masters degree Mechanical Engineering/Mechanical Engineering Technology with at least three years industrial experience.

May teach courses, such as: Statics, Dynamics, Strength of Materials, Materials and Metallurgy, Hydraulics, Thermodynamics, Mechanical Design, 3D CAD courses, and some general engineering courses.

Starting date could be sooner but most likely January 2007. Closing date for receipt of application materials, October 1, 2006. For more information on application requirements and to print off the required application: http://www.stlcc.edu/career/joblist.asp#facultyft

ASEE Announces New User Interface for K-12 Outreach Program Database

Regular users of the EngineeringK12 Center’s outreach program database will now find the collection of K-12 and pre-college engineering, math, science, and technology programs easier to use and convenient to update.  By simply registering with the database, outreach program providers will now have access to the new user interface, allowing them to add, edit, and manage listings at anytime.  This feature will ensure that the most current information on engineering outreach programs is available to database searchers.

Home to hundreds of listings, the EngineeringK12 Center’s outreach program database is a great resource for parents, teachers, and students to search nationwide for an outreach program that matches their needs.  From lesson plans for teachers, to engineering summer camps for students, the database offers a wide variety of programs offered by universities, industry, and government.  Registration is only required to add and manage an outreach program in the database.  Registration is not required simply to search.

You can register to be an outreach program database user at:
http://www.engineeringk12.org/educators/making_engineers_cool/search.cfm

Connections is brought to you by the American Society for Engineering Education.

Over 12,000 engineering and engineering technology faculty members and administrators enjoy the many benefits and services that ASEE offers. The Society's award-winning magazine ASEE Prism and academic publications (Journal of Engineering Education and Profiles of Engineering Colleges) keep members up to date with the best and latest in engineering education, engineering research trends, and academic issues, while 47 professional interest groups and a varied selection of meetings provide professional development and networking opportunities that no other society can offer within the engineering education community. Members also receive reduced rates at local and national conferences, discounts on ASEE products, money-saving members-only discounts on financial, insurance, and travel programs, plus an ever growing variety of online services. Our goal is to focus on issues that matter the most to you in our publications, meetings, and on-line services, and to enable you to interact with others who share your specific engineering and educational interests. To join online, just go to www.asee.org/members, or contact our member services department at 202-331-3520 for further information.

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