Integrating virtual internships into online classrooms
With the rapid increase in the number of online enrollments, educators are faced with the challenge of ensuring on-campus experiences are available to distant students, which meet quality and accessibility expectations. One of the biggest challenges with online courses is constructing meaningful group projects for part-time students who can be in disparate time zones. As part of our Master's biotechnology programme, offered completely online, we have developed a capstone course for students approaching graduation, which integrates a semester-long project working with a small biotechnology company in the DC metro area into the course curriculum. The experience and results from these projects have been well received by the participating students and companies. We describe some of the challenges we have faced, strategies we have developed, and ongoing modifications to the programme to integrate projects with small biotechnology businesses into the online classroom.
Structuring assignments to improve understanding and presentation skills: Experiential learning in the capstone strategic management team presentation
ABSTRACT In the strategic management course, students select, analyze, and present viable future alternatives based on information provided in cases or computer simulations. Rather than understanding the entire process, the student's focus is on the final presentation. Chickering's (1977) research on active learning suggests students learn more effectively when participating in analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. The authors highlight instructional changes with students, gathering primary data independently and later comparing findings in a team-based scaffolding process. Statistical analysis of students' self-reported understanding scores both before and following the experiential intervention support the benefits. Qualitative comments by the students, embedded librarian, faculty, and business practitioners also indicate improved learning resulted from course modifications.
Training faculty to coach capstone design teams
During senior capstone experiences, student teams are often given a faculty advisor to teach andassist them. Our experience has shown that using the traditional student/faculty teaching model isnot an efficient or effective approach to the student learning of design and team processes. Theobjective of the paper is to show that successful learning experiences for capstone design teamsrequire faculty to shift their role from a traditional lecture or consulting role to a coaching role.Research into key indicators of engineering design team success related to coaching focused onteam observations, individual and team interviews, and individual team member and coach surveys.Results shows that a successful coaching role encompasses three main responsibilities: mentor,mediator and manager. Specific expectations and activities that a coach should fulfill to aid in thesuccess of capstone teams can be established.