The Alchemy Of Helping Freshmen Turn Dreams Into Reality

Freshmen bring with them a multitude of habits based upon their high school experience. Freshmen seldom question the transferability of learned habits and assume they will apply equally well to the university environment. Consequently, the “Ready, Fire, Aim” philosophy best describes the student’s mentality as they embark on the academic rigors of college life. This paper describes an “Academic Resolution Exercise” instituted in the Freshman Engineering Technology seminar. It is specifically designed to teach freshmen how to establish, monitor and accomplish academic goals essential for them to successfully transition to the significant academic demands of a higher education institution. Ultimately, the results of this exercise enhance the probability of students succeeding academically in their critical first year. Their success, in turn, assists the university’s student retention rate. Introduction Freshmen are often ill prepared for the scholastic demands of an engineering or engineering technology program. They frequently learn the hard way that the study habits and techniques used successfully in high school are insufficient in the demanding college atmosphere. In addition, for many, it is the first time that they are managing their time and responsibilities without the aid of their parents. In business and industry, setting and charting goals has long been recognized as an effective business practice. According to Jeffery Mayer, author of Setting and Achieving Your Goals, “When you know what you want, and have created a plan to get you there, everything else falls into place.” (1) It is always advantageous for students to learn what will be expected of them in industry. Suggested in the paper is a method that empowers professors to have an influence on the habits of freshmen. Freshmen will be expected to set goals, assess their progress, and hold themselves and their team members accountable. The process required to implement the given method will teach students some of the fundamentals of project management such as setting specific, realistic, and measurable goals. P ge 9.227.1 Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering Educators Concept Development This exercise was first implemented at the University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown during the 2002-2003 school year. It was repeated, with modification, during the 2003-2004 year. In both cases the exercise was conducted in the second semester of the freshman year. The exercise was not implemented during the first term in order for students to obtain an understanding of what is expected of them in a college atmosphere. The exercise, conducted in the context of student teams consisting of three (3) freshman Engineering Technology students, begins with a simple statement of personal academic aspiration of each student for the semester. Students are given the freedom to write any scholastic goal that they have. The process of formulating and writing a goal often is a benefit in and of itself. The student will be far more aware of it. The specific goal itself is not important to the process. The goals will vary per the individual; one student may be striving to achieve a 4.0 while another may set a goal of simply passing a difficult course. Instruction then follows on what constitutes a valid and authentic goal and how it must be articulated in the form of four specific elements: realistic, specific, measurable and written, and completion date. This is often the most difficult step for the students to grasp. The students are instructed that a goal is realistic if it is achievable within the time frame allotted. An example of an unrealistic goal is one that requires the student to study 20 hours a day. The elements of specific and measurable goals require the most interaction from the professors. An example of one students’ initial goal was, “Don’t be so lazy about school”. This goal is too broad; it was not clear to what the student is referring. Following feedback from the professors the student rewrote his goal to say, “I will arrive 5 minutes before the start of all classes.” Following review the students are able to re-state their goals in measurable terms. In industry, measurable goals are an oft used technique for the management of projects, tasks, and even personnel. Without the measurability of a goal it is difficult to assess the level of accomplishment. Examples of measurable goals are: 1) Do homework, skip only one assignment per class 2) I will get 7 hours of sleep a night. 3) I will do assignments the day they are assigned. Once the students rewrite their aspirations so they conform to an authentic goal, it is advisable that the seminar professors review the students’ rewritten goals and offer comments on their measurability prior to moving to the next step. The tendency remains for students to use terms like “do better” or “do more”. The final goals are presented to the other team members who scrutinize and validate each goal, again ensuring they contain the four specific elements: realistic, specific, measurable and written, and completion date. Each team member signs an “Academic Resolution Worksheet” authenticating his or her input and the process of accountability commences. Goal accountability is the responsibility of the team members. Each team sits together at the weekly freshman seminar. The first ten minutes are devoted to each team member discussing the progress or lack of it they made on each goal during the previous week. Students assign a “percentage” to each goal indicative of how thoroughly they performed the goal for the week. For example, if a student’s goal was to complete all homework before watching TV, they may assign a 60% saying that they held true to the goal only that percentage of the time. A copy of an Academic P ge 9.227.2 Proceedings of the 2004 American Society for Engineering Education Annual Conference & Exposition Copyright © 2004, American Society for Engineering Educators Resolution Worksheet is attached in the Appendix. Encouragement and chastisement occurs naturally in the teams adding a serious dimension to the exercise. This process keeps the students focused on their goals. Knowing that each week their progress will be reviewed with their peers prevents them from ignoring the goals they have set. Having the freshmen work in teams is a benefit in many ways. Accountability is certainly the focus of this exercise, however, it also helps new students become integrated in to the program and build alliances. By having students focus on goals they are able to see that their peers are often struggling with many of the same issues they are. According to Thomas Quick, author of Successful Team Building, “People want to work well together, to support one another, because they identify with the team.” (2) Analysis and Findings The findings from the students’ weekly assessment portion of the Academic Resolution Worksheet showed steady progress. For the three weeks that progress was collected, an increase in goal achievement was observed (Figure 1). The small increase in percent progress is perhaps due to the difficulty of changing bad habits over a short period of time. While the progress is small, 4%, it shows that students were, for the most part, doing what they had earlier defined as needed for success. FIGURE 1 Goal Acheivement