Minutes
Computer and Electronics Engineering Technology
Advisory Committee Meeting
November 15, 2004
7 P.M. – Room B35
Present: Kenny Aldridge, Frank Caldwell, Tony Donato, Evelyn Horne, George Kostell,
Gopal Mohan, Dan Morrison, John Nagle, Viji Padmanabhan, Al Sanderlin, Ashley Segal, Dr. Cree Stout, Dr. Marc Tarplee
George Kostell opened the meeting by introducing himself and John Nagle as co-chairmen of the committee. After welcoming everyone, he invited them to introduce themselves giving their company and their job functions. Marc Tarplee moved to accept the minutes from the last meeting. The motion was seconded by John Nagle. The minutes were accepted unanimously.
None
New Business— ABET
Dr. Tarplee said, “ABET decided to reaccredit the programs for two years instead of the normal six years.” The one thing that made them uneasy was our continuous improvement program. York Tech has one that’s called institutional effectiveness, and the ABET audit team is not happy with it as it now exists. They recommended some changes namely closing the loop. This means how the results of the assessments were used to effect changes in the programs. These changes are expected to be in place by January. On the departmental level, the ABET team were happy with the curriculum, faculty, and the advisory committee; they were very impressed with the Electronics/Computer Engineering Technology programs. Dr. Marc Tarplee said he was pleased with our performance under the ABET audit. ABET changed their technique for auditing programs in 2000. ABET went to a new out-come based system where they wanted us to measure what the students were learning, and use the results of those measurements to make program improvements rather than the old prescriptive criteria. Dr. Tarplee will prepare for a follow-up visit or evaluation. Dr. Cree Stout asked Dr. Tarplee if ABET would be revisiting, or would there be documentation; Dr. Tarplee said ABET didn’t believe another visit was required, and wanted review documents. We need to tighten up our documentation.
Mr. Kostell suggested that measuring the student learning would be subjective rather than objective. Dr. Tarplee stressed that ABET had specific criteria that must be measured that we do not know how to measure at this time. At an ABET meeting in the Fall, Dr. Tarplee asked the ABET committee how they expected to measure some criteria. It was suggested by ABET that surveys would be acceptable.
Dr. Tarplee said measuring Learning-Outcomes was important, but he didn’t share ABET’ s point of view that all is important. Changes in the programs involve students having capstone projects, and will have some things to choose from. Instructors will be evaluating students for not just putting the project together, but also the students will have to do a presentation which will gage their written and oral communication along with checklists including team work. We are considering a comprehensive exit exam such as a certification exam to determine the extent of learning. We have to have a process for using the measurements to make improvements in the program.
Dr. Stout gave everyone a list of program criteria as specified by ABET. Recommendations come from: student, ABET, etc. She said the spreadsheet is going have a link back to where these recommendations come from. The assessment method comes afterwards. For example, the spreadsheet says this year’s results are fed into the recommendations for next year.
Dr. Tarplee told the committee members they would be getting more surveys from York Tech, he thought it would be good to survey the graduates’ employers. By surveying the employers, you will find out how the skills the students require match with their needs. Also, survey the graduates and see how they are getting along; and if what they did while here, match with what they do on the jobs.
Dr. Stout said they were planning three different surveys: 1.) an exit survey for the students who are graduating or near graduation.; 2.) a graduate survey that will be given to graduates about 6 to 8 months after graduation asking basically the same things that were asked on the exit survey; and 3.) an employers survey that will ask the employer the same questions that students and graduates are asked. These three surveys will complete the triangularization required by ABET.
Dr. Stout said they have three capstone courses for each program: Senior Project, Senior Seminar, and the Troublesooting course. Dr. Stout said she would like to have some of the people in the field or engineers to come in and speak to students to give an idea of what’s going on once they get into the job market as well as having the students do some shadowing. Senior Seminar will be a “catch-all” course that will cover things such as ethics, cultural diversity, resume writing, cover letters, interviewing, dress, etc. that is difficult to teach in other courses. The exit exam will also be given in the Senior Seminar. The exit exam will cover the basics learned in the programs.
Dr. Stout showed the group the criteria for each of the certificate programs as well explaining that these were required for SACS but not for ABET.
Dr. Tarlee said SACS has adopted ABET’s way of evaluating programs. SACS has decided to go with the Learning Outcomes model. The ET programs, having gone through this with ABET, are in good shape. But all programs across the campus will need to pursue the same course. Our first round of documentation goes on at the end of March to the off-site team; the on-site visit will be in October 2005, and if all goes well, we will get reaccredited for another ten years. Dr. Tarplee indicated that he felt that affirmation is good in that it holds us accountable and more focused on the customer—the student. The emphasis has gone from what are you teaching to what are the students learning.
Assessment Methods
Dr. Stout asked the committee to look at the surveys to see if there was anything that would make them uncomfortable with responding to them—as a student, graduate or employer. Everyone indicated that they were comfortable with what was asked and indicated the questions were worded in such a way that anxiety in answering the questions would be eliminated.
Tony Donato thought the surveys were good, but had concerns about how the skills would be taught. More and more graduates will be going into field service and they needed to learn how to deal with customers. Communications are important. Do you go after someone with experience with bad habits, or do you go after someone who is inexperienced and train them. How do you teach urgency in fixing equipment? These are questions that are being asked by all employers.
Dr. Tarplee said we try to do something about the students’ time-management skills. He said, he is constantly reminding them that this is the first step in their career. Students are going to have to do customer service to get more hands-on experience. Students should understand that there is no excuse for late submissions. Dr. Tarplee wants the students to have a tremendous amount of hands-on experience rather than virtual simulations. Perhaps a section on customer service can be included in the Senior Seminar.
George Kostel said it
is important for students not to tell the customer what they think the customer wants to hear. Rather the student should be able to
tactfully tell the customer what the problem is
and how soon the problem can be corrected.
Dr. Tarplee said,
the students should understand that they should not set up unrealistic expectations
to undermine the customer. If something
cannot be done in the time frame that the customer wants, they should let them
know. How this is to be taught is unknown.
Tony Donato suggested the best way
was “baptism by fire”.
Al Sanderlin related a customer
service issue he encountered earlier in the month. He was impressed with the way the service
representative handled the situation.
Danny Morrison indicated that
experience was the best teacher in handling pressure by both the customer as
well as superiors. He wanted to know if
the students could be taught not to be the person applying the
pressure. Danny indicated that most of
the service people are working hard to correct the problems, and a simple
understanding by all parties that established priorities had to be followed
would serve to eliminate a lot of the pressures and customer service problems.
Tony Donato reemphasized that
common courtesy, professionalism and culture diversity to understand the push
and the pull of everything—a reality check. Students need to understand this.
Al Sanderlin asked what would be
the best way to get a high percentage return rate on the surveys—phone calls,
email, paper mail, web survey, personal visits.
Tony Donato: Few people return
voice mail messages. John Nagle: email would be best.
Danny Morrison: personal visits are not really the best way
to go. Tony Donato: you got to sell me on why I should spend ten
minutes of my time to fill out your survey.
Tony prefers one on one interview.
Other Business:
Ashley Segal said the co-op internship had about eighty
students each semester both paid and unpaid.
She said many of the students work through the co-op internship and get
hired. In the spring semester 2004, she had one student enrolled in the computer
system network certificate intern with
Dr. Tarplee said he manages a foreign exchange program;
primarily for German students, and he gets calls from
George Kostell asked if there was anything else to be discussed. There was none.
A motion to adjourn by Marc Tarplee and
seconded by Tony Donato, carried and the meeting adjourned at
Respectfully submitted, Mary Davis