Facilitating Remote Electrical and Computer Engineering Teaching: Seizing the Moment with Project RECET

The overall goal of Project RECET (Remote Electrical and Computer Engineering Teaching) is to help provide quality ECE education when fully online, and explore issues associated with blended online and in-person instruction for the future. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, online and online compatible techniques for teaching Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) were not widely deployed across US ECE Departments. As ECE educators and students became more experienced with remote education during 2020 and 2021, they learned that the choice between face-to-face and online instruction is not an either-or proposition. Most instructors and institutions have come to realize that what COVID required them to do should become at least part of the new normal to realize the best possible learning environment for their students. They have also learned the value of actively sharing course content with other institutions and industry. Project RECET will help disseminate materials, strategies, and best practices that will have a significant impact on the ECE Community across all levels of education and be an engine for both short- and long-term change in the ECE education enterprise. Online infrastructure, workshops, tutorials, and other support activities will be managed by the ECE Department Heads Association (ECEDHA), a neutral non-profit organization whose members include most US ECE departments. ECEDHA also maintains close working relationships with industry leaders. The scope of the initial RECET roll out will be limited to introductory analog and digital circuits courses, but a key goal of the project is to prepare to scale up to a comprehensive activity that supports the complete breadth of the ECE curriculum and can be adopted by other engineering disciplines.

The team hypothesizes that there is a large and growing cohort of ECE instructors and practicing engineers who see the value of freely sharing online relevant course content they have developed with all ECE programs. The team also hypothesizes that a significant number of institutions will adopt fully online ECE instruction--including labs--if contributed course content is well organized, supported by an independent neutral organization that is not solely affiliated with any one university or company, content is tagged through a joint academy-industry process, content is minimally branded, and adequate training and support infrastructure is provided. This collective approach can begin a fundamental cultural shift in which ECE programs more fully utilize the evidence-based research from the engineering education community and industry is more directly engaged in ECE student learning. The results from this study will help prepare ECE departments nationally to deploy remote learning experiences that will improve student understanding and better prepare them for success in industry. There are two principal outcomes expected of a successful effort. One is the product (an online content collection), and the other is the process by which the product will have been created, maintained, socialized, and owned. If the effort is successful, the content collection will be compatible with, and invite participation by, all ECE departments across the diverse US ECE ecosystem and will identify a roadmap for translating the same successes to other engineering disciplines. The process will also nurture a trans-institutional culture in which US ECE faculty members work as members of a national community beyond their local department. The impact of engineering education research on ECE education will also be increased. A final potential broader impact is that a successful project will identify a roadmap for translating the same successes to other engineering disciplines, beyond ECE.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.