Interdisciplinary (99) The Engaged Interdisciplinary Learning in Sustainability (EILS) project is designed to integrate new pedagogies, analytical skills and applied techniques to daily activities and practices critical to sustainability in the context of higher education. The project involves close interdisciplinary collaboration between faculty from engineering and social sciences, through creation and delivery of a series of courses, labs, teaching methods and materials in sustainability engineering and ecological design. EILS seeks to develop the field of "Sustainability Science and Sustainability Studies" (S4) and formalize it as a new intedisciplinary field. S4 is critical to a successful transition to a Nation and world that effectively and equitably protects the planet's environment and ecology. The project's approach to S4 rests on the interdisciplinary integration of technical-scientific and social science fields of inquiry, taking as its focus research into and teaching about the engineering, scientific and social science elements of current and future policy and practice. The project applies new pedagogical approaches in courses, laboratory exercises, internships, workshops and careful assessment of instructor and student achievements. The project includes elements of STEM education, cyberlearning, and technological and social literacy elements, directed toward education of skilled professionals. This curriculum includes interactive laboratories in renewable energy systems, water resources, ecological footprint, sustainable agriculture, urban design, and life-cycle analysis which are accessible to students with diverse backgrounds. Most courses will include a service learning project for students with different disciplines to work together. This provides the opportunity to learn about engineering design and real life social implementation issues. Course and co-curricular materials are supplemented by detailed instructor manuals with emphasis on learner-centered pedagogy supported by formative and peer assessment strategies and a Handbook for Sustainability Engineering and Ecological Design.
In this project, we developed a combination of hands-on laboratories, community projects, and on-line learning modules for undergraduate students in order to create a comprehensive learning environment that cultivates innovation and inclusiveness, builds quantitative skills, and expands topical knowledge about renewable energies and societal issues related to sustainable development. We developed interdisciplinary sustainability laboratories that provide a structured pedagogy for courses pursuing sustainability projects intended to reduce carbon footprint in the community. The hands-on laboratories cover a variety of sustainable energy technologies that can be built with cheap components, i.e. photovoltaic-driven motor, hydroelectricity turbine, thermoelectricity, wind energy, and fuel cell car. Online video instructions and lab grading allowed including hands-on activities in large classes with minimum teaching assistant support. Engineering design processes on sustainable packaging of consumer goods, life cycle analysis in biofuels, photovoltaics, and cell phones, have also been an important topic for the sustainability labs to increase STEM literacy of students with no science and engineering background. By transferring the labs to highly interactive web platform, we have made these learning modules accessible to many universities including UC Santa Cruz, San Jose State University, Santa Clara University, Purdue University, and several community colleges for use in their classes. One of the key components to this web-based platform is greatly enhanced interactivity between students and instructor, which complements the class and laboratory activities. A series of one-line simulation tools developed on the nanoHUB.org utilizes highly-interactive and user-friendly graphical interfaces, and helps students independently tackle the engineering design problems and introduces latest advances in nanostructured materials and waste heat recovery research for more advanced undergraduates. We have also developed a framework for interdisciplinary student projects in large classes (up to 200 students). The idea is to complement conventional lectures with hands-on, community-driven projects to be undertaken by multidisciplinary teams of 4-6 students. This creates links with the university, city and local businesses and allow students to see how sustainability principles are implemented in "real-life." The team projects also provide an opportunity for students in different majors to interact and learn from each other. We have developed a manual for instructors, students and mentors, as well as other useful resources, such as a list of potential topics and examples of good projects. A paper summarizing our efforts in community-based projects received the Best Paper Award from American Society of Engineering Education in June 2013. We developed assessment tools based on web-based pre/post questionnaires in existing courses and labs. Initial assessment results show significant improvement in student learning and highly positive responses from students about the use the online simulation tools for improved learning. We still offer our main renewable energy and sustainability courses at UCSC, Purdue University, and partner universities, and keep monitoring student learning outcomes as the labs and discussions sessions are modified and improved.
