The impact of problem-based learning strategies on STEM knowledge integration and attitudes: an exploratory study among female Taiwanese senior high school students

This study was designed to explore the effects of problem-based learning (PBL) strategies on the attitudes of female senior high school students toward integrated knowledge learning in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM). Content analysis and focus group methods were adopted as the research processes. Data and information about the STEM internet platform, an attitude scale and the contents of interviews were also collected for analysis. The subjects were 10th grade students at a girls’ senior high school who volunteered to organize teams for a Solar Electric Trolley Contest. A total of 40 students were grouped into 18 teams. The results of the study indicate: (1) that PBL strategies can be helpful in enhancing students’ attitudes toward STEM learning and the exploration of future career choices; (2) that the PBL teaching strategy helped to lead students step by step toward completing the contest’s mission and to experience the meaning of integrated STEM knowledge; (3) that not only that students can actively apply engineering and science knowledge, but also that students tend to gain more solid science and mathematics knowledge through STEM learning in PBL; and (4) that PBL can enhance students’ abilities and provide them experiences related to knowledge integration and application. Therefore, it is recommended that the curriculum at the girls’ senior high school include more content related to specialty subjects to enhance their technological capabilities. In addition, a learning mechanism should be offered to aid advisers or teachers in strengthening students’ integrated and systematic knowledge about STEM.     

Improving engineering skills in high school students: a partnership between university and K-12 teachers

The level of science skills in Spanish students are significantly below the average of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, and university teachers agree that the level of freshmen students’ skills is too low. Moreover, the number of engineering enrollments has been declining in recent years. The purpose of this study is to improve both the level of knowledge and skills of students upon entrance into engineering programs and their general opinion about engineering studies. The aim is to establish the importance of proper coordination between groups involved in the overall educational process and to avoid, at least in part, the decline in recent engineering enrollments. The project had the following four phases: (1) determination of the freshmen’s weakest concepts; (2) assessment of high schools students’ knowledge; (3) development of educational activities; and (4) re-assessment of high school students. These measures were complemented with the high school teachers’ opinions about the students improvements and analyses of the evolution of engineering enrollments. Most of the participants significantly improved their knowledge and skills. Similarly, high school teachers believed that the attitude of the students toward engineering improved significantly.     

Rehearsal of professional practice: impacts of web-based collaborative learning on the future encounter of different disciplines

This study argues that the shift towards a more multidisciplinary professional life in contemporary design practice requires design curricula to equip students with collaborative skills. The study offers that by the aid of web-based collaborative learning (WBCL) in design education, different disciplines may be brought together during their education. A case study is held as a rehearsal of professional life; involving architecture and interior architecture students collaborating on a common project, using WBCL. The evaluations of the participating students about the process were analyzed. The findings convey that there is a mutual problem of recognition of professional domains. In order to diagnose and possibly reconcile tensions that may occur due to this problem in professional life, this paper asserts that integrating interdisciplinary work to the design curricula would be beneficial.     

基于DEMATEL方法的高校协同创新科研绩效评价影响因素分析

为了能够客观地评价高校科研绩效,以科研基础、科研项目、执行情况、科研效益、经济效益、社会效益等6维度为基础,构建了一套适用于协同创新机制下的高校科研绩效评价指标体系,选取了19个影响高校科研绩效评价的因素,应用DEMATEL方法建立直接影响矩阵,计算综合影响矩阵、原因度和中心度,指出协同创新下影响高校科研的因素主要来自于社会效益和科研基础,其中关键影响因素是科研经费和科研平台。结果表明,协同创新环境下的高校科研绩效评价差异明显,科研基础、科研项目、效益是构建科研绩效评价指标体系的重要影响因素,所得结论对协同创新环境下改进高校科研绩效评价具有借鉴意义。     

Finding the connection between research and design: the knowledge development of STEM teachers in a professional learning community

International Journal of Technology and Design Education - Research and design activities are becoming more important in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) and D&T...     

Effects of collaborative communication on the development of market-relating capabilities and relational performance metrics in industrial markets

Research in marketing suggests that collaborative communication is important for firms to sustain competitive advantage, especially in industrial markets. This study integrates relational and resource-based views to articulate how collaborative communication influences different relational performance metrics. Based on a survey of 167 marketing executives in Taiwan's electronics industry, empirical findings indicate that market-relating capabilities (i.e., market-linking and marketing capabilities) completely mediate the collaborative communication–financial performance relationship, while market-relating capabilities partially mediate the collaborative communication–customer-focused performance relationship. In addition, collaborative communication directly influences customer cooperation performance instead of indirectly affecting it through the development of market-relating capabilities. The results of this study provide new insights into the role of collaborative communication as well as important theoretical and managerial implications.     

The structure of students’ knowledge and self-concepts. Part B. The structure of students’ self-concepts in industrial high school

The purpose of this study is to analyze the structure of industrial high school students’ self-concepts. The survey was conducted on 1,040 industrial high school students in Japan. A factor analysis was carried out, and five factors were identified: F1, attitude toward self-discipline; F2, attitude toward career development; F3, attitude toward professional skill development; F4, attitude toward social values; F5, attitude toward self-monitoring. It is suggested that the structure of students’ self-concepts in industrial high school includes these five components. The results of an ANOVA test showed that, there were significant differences among students of the three different grades for F1, F2, and F3. The mean scores for F1 and F2 became higher for older students, while the mean scores for F3 went down for older students. The results also showed a problem in that as the school year increases, the consciousness of professional development is reduced.     

Career orientation of secondary school students (m/f) in the Netherlands

In this paper, a new perspective is developed to promote a positive relationship between young people and technology. An in-depth study of the values young Dutch secondary school students feel are essential in their future profession was made. Following organisational psychologist Edgar Schein, we distinguish career anchors, each with their own core value. These core values show that differences between young people are considerable and explain why it is often so difficult to get grip on the decisive factors in the choice of a career. Although all girls have to deal with the masculine image of technology, they are not a homogenuous group as they pursue different values. Many of the anchors can be fullfilled by following study and career path in technology. However, current careers in technology are insufficiently associated with values such as creativity, service, autonomy and entrepeneurial. The educational system has been emphasizing the functional, expert anchor, but is gradually changing and preparing for the rise of the creative society that has been described by the economist Richard Florida. In contrast with Schein, we show that career anchors can already be indentified in secondary school students and added a new anchor identity.     

新时期水利水电建设对生态环境影响初探

随着人类认识水平的提高和科学技术的发展,未来的水利水电工程应该是在为人类创造巨大的社会效益和经济效益的同时,发挥其对生态环境的积极作用,降低或消除破坏作用。因此,新时期水电建设应该把生态环境问题放在重要的位置,要优先考虑生态环境问题,以达到资源开发利用与生态环境保护的双赢。     

The role of sense of community and motivation in the collaborative learning: an examination of the first-year design course

International Journal of Technology and Design Education - The demand for creating collaborative learning environments in technology education highlights the needs to enhance student collaborations...     

Exploring the learning problems and resource usage of undergraduate industrial design students in design studio courses

Design is a powerful weapon for modern companies so it is important to have excellent designers in the industry. The purpose of this study is to explore the learning problems and the resources that students use to overcome problems in undergraduate industrial design studio courses. A survey with open-type questions was conducted to collect data. Participants in this study were 189 undergraduate industrial design students from three universities, and two coding schema were formulated for analysing the data. The results demonstrated that the most difficult design tasks included concept generation, design presentation, and design research. The learning resources used to solve the learning problems included four categories: people, object, method, and environment. This information will increase the understanding of the learning process of students and provide a reference for teaching and the setting of learning resources in industrial design education.     

An examination of the relationships between leadership style, quality, and employee satisfaction in R&D versus administrative environments

Academics and executives argue that effective leadership is a key predictor of R&D success as well as quality management. Recent research highlights transformational leadership as a highly effective style shown to predict performance in organizations. However, no study examined the role of transformational and transactional leadership in building quality climate in R&D versus non-R&D settings. We examined the relationship between leadership style and the establishment of a quality environment in an R&D setting based on an empirical study of 511 research engineers and scientists. It is found that both transformational leadership and transactional contingent-reward leadership are related to the establishment of a quality environment in the R&D part of a telecommunications firm. However, the impact of transactional contingent-reward leadership ceases to be significant once both leadership styles are considered simultaneously using structural equations. A transformational leadership style was also found to be related to employee satisfaction.     

Implementing the lead user method in a high technology firm: A longitudinal study of intentions versus actions

The customer or user's role in the new product development process is limited or nonexistent in many high technology firms, despite evidence that suggests customers are frequently an excellent source for new product ideas with great market potential. This article examines the implementation of the Lead User method for gathering new product ideas from leading edge customers by an IT firm that had not previously done much customer research during their new product development efforts. This case study follows the decision‐makers of the firm through the process, where the end result is the generation of a number of useful product concepts. Besides the ideas generated, management at the firm is also impressed with the way the method makes their new product development process more cross‐functional and they plan to make it a part of their future new product development practices. Approximately one year later the firm is revisited to find out if the Lead User method has become a permanent part of their new product development process. The authors find, however, that the firm has abandoned research on the customer despite the fact that several of the lead‐user derived product concepts had been successfully implemented. Management explanations for their return to a technology push process for developing new products include personnel turnover and lack of time. Using organizational learning theory to examine the case, the authors suggest that the nontechnology specific product concepts generated by the lead users were seen as ambiguous and hence overly simplistic and less valuable by the new product development personnel. The technical language spoken by the new product personnel also increased the inertia of old technology push development process by making it more prestigious and comfortable to plan new products with their technology suppliers. The fact that the firm was doing well throughout this process also decreased the pressure to change from their established new product development routine. The implications for these finding are that: 1) it is necessary to pressure or reward personnel in order to make permanent changes to established routines, and 2) researchers should be careful at taking managers at their word when asking them about their future intentions.     

集群环境下生产制造型企业与第三方物流的协同决策研究

为了解决集群环境下生产制造型企业与第三方物流之间合理的收益分配与风险共担问题,提高协同企业系统的运行效果,在探析集群环境下双方在协同模式中的收益与风险关系基础上,提出了基于Shapley值的协同收益分配与风险分摊决策模型,分别探索了以物流成本与收益分配,物流成本与风险损失两对变量之间的波动变化规律,并将之集成计算得出了协同选择的临界点与取值范围,辅助参与企业决策,通过实证研究验证了收益分配曲线与风险量化曲线的正向相关性波动规律。结果表明:集群环境中的生产制造型企业与第三方物流的协同模式具有以市场需求为中心的组织特点,影响协同选择的风险因素主要有生产制造型企业和第三方物流的地位与作用、协同各方投入与贡献度随时间推移产生的变化、外部产业政策及内部自适应等;在协同过程中,各参与企业所获得的收益与承担的风险与所投入的物流成本之间存在着正相关关系,且存在着选择临界点;模型演算出的协同选择临界点,可保障协同模型的长期性与稳定性。研究结果为物流协同选择研究提供了新思路,对企业协同选择决策具有借鉴意义。     

Open versus closed innovation: development of the wide strip mill for steel in the United States during the 1920s

A paired comparison is made between rival attempts to develop the first continuous rolling mill for wide strip in the United States during the 1920s. One firm was secretive, and the other relied on collaboration. Development of the wide strip mill is a natural experiment comparing closed and open innovation as two firms were competing for the same target using different institutional arrangements for their R&D. Wide strip‐rolling technology was developed by rival teams in the United States during the mid‐1920s. The less successful team at Armco, Ashland, Ky was closed to outside influences. Breakthroughs came from Columbia Steel at Butler, PA, which pursued an open pattern of cooperation with equipment suppliers. Columbia Steel's collaboration with machinery suppliers, use of independent advice on bearing technology and willingness to learn from precursors in copper rolling enabled them to build a successful wide strip mill complex, commissioned in 1926. Butler established the dominant design for the next 80 years. The leading equipment supplier at Butler, the United Engineering and Foundry Co., led global sales of the technology for four decades. It is not clear how far this example of successful open innovation in the US inter‐war economy is typical. Historical studies of the management of R&D focus on formal, science‐based research in large corporate labs rather than engineering development.     

九龙江流域水环境状况及治理对策初探

通过对福建漳州九龙江流域的流域水文气象特性、水生态和水环境状况的调查分析,结合流域内人类生产活动对环境影响的状况,剖析了九龙江流域的水土流失问题和水环境质量状况,以及产生的因素和面临的问题.提出了九龙江流域水生态和水环境问题的应对措施,旨在为九龙江流域生态环境治理,水环境监测体系构建,为漳州地区社会经济的可持续发展提供决策支撑.     

加强学习交流,提高企业发展——上海市玩具行业协会八届十次理事会浙江云和举行

近日,上海市玩具行业协会八届十次理事会在浙江云和举行,浙江云和县政府、云和玩具协会、浙江新云木业集团、浙江振鹏实业和浙江和信集团等相关领导和企业负责人对本次会议的召开给予大力支持,并热情接待了来自上海市玩具行业协会的同仁们。与会嘉宾纷纷表示,要加强业界同仁之间的沟通交流,通过积极进