Continuous Improvement In An Met Program

In 1995, the Technology Accreditation Commission of the Accreditation board for Engineering and Technology (TAC of ABET) approved a new criteria which places direct responsibility on each engineering technology program to plan and implement continuous improvement and furthermore, they must demonstrate achievements. The criteria (V.A.3.) and (V.A.4.) appeared in draft form in the 1996-97 criteria release; and since there have been no serious objections to date, this criteria will most likely appear in binding form in the 1997-98 release. The Mechanical Engineering Technology (MET) Department at Purdue University anticipated this requirement and first began to prepare for it during the spring of 1994. Several of the resulting initiatives have been accomplished and others are in various stages of progress. Since, the requirement is for “continuous improvement,” most of the initiatives will never be finalized but will be ongoing in nature. In the following paper, the authors present the background and environment which seem to contribute to the criteria change. Then, perceived justifications for the new criteria will be presented. Thirdly, the various initiatives that have been launched in the MET Department at Purdue will be outlined and briefly described. Some of the positive outcomes which have already been realized as a result of the continuous improvement efforts are described and conclusions are drawn in the final section. Background There was considerable propagation in the length of the TAC of ABET criteria in the early years while they were in the formative stage. The criteria expanded in scope from a few pages to the format of approximately 25 pages as they appear today. However, during the past decade the criteria have matured and changes have been less frequent. In a 1992 panel discussion on TAC of ABET Criteria and Accreditation, Dr. Fred Emshousen carefully tracked the evolution of the criteria from inception to the then present time. He concluded “The number of changes per year has decreased indicating a stabilization of expectations and furthermore a sign that TAC operations have matured and stabilized regarding process and operations as well.” [1] Conversely, in the past few years since 1992, renewed interest in change has been initiated in academic accreditation and assessment. There has been a strong movement in professional organizations and accreditation bodies towards “outcome-based” accreditation standards. Regional academic accreditation organizations have made a rapid transition to this type of standard. Typical regional accreditations now focus on student learning and achievement (outcome-based standards) rather than on faculty, courses and facilities (input standards). This in turn has caused substantial movement in specialized accreditation agencies to also P ge 214.1 2 contemplatethis trend. This is certainly true with ABET. Recently the Engineering Accreditation Commission (EAC) of ABET has proposed new out-come based criteria for engineering programs. These criteria known as “Criteria 2000” [2] are currently being utilized in pilot accreditation visits with plans for full implementation on or before the year 2000. In conjunction with the national movement towards outcome-based assessment, there has also been a great deal of interest in applying Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) principles that have been so successful in industry to academic institutions and programs. It is the combination of these two movements, that prompted TAC to closely examine its current accreditation criteria and practices. Some of the advantages and disadvantages of current TAC of ABET practices and proposed ideas for the future are presented in an earlier paper by Pagano [3]. For the present, TAC has chosen to maintain its course, and has resisted wide-scale adoption of the outcomebased philosophy. Conversely, TAC has fully supported the integration of continuing improvement expectations into the criteria. To examine and possibly implement some of these changes, TAC convened a mid-year working session in February 1995. Some of the actions that were considered at this meeting resulted in the TAC criteria revisions which are the subject of this paper and are given below [4]. “V.A.3. Programs must have written goals which are consistent with overall institutional goals. These goals must, as a minimum, focus on the student body served, resource allocation, and other factors directly affecting the program. Articulation of goals should be accomplished through specification of objectives by which achievement toward goals can be measured. Programs must demonstrate achievements through various methods, e.g., student outcome assessments, graduate career performance and employer feedback measures. V.A.4. Programs must have plans for continuous improvement. The visiting team will be looking for evidence which demonstrates implementation of continuous improvement processes and procedures for each program. Several individuals in the School of Technology (SOT) at Purdue University are involved in TAC of ABET activities and were aware of the changes being contemplated. In anticipation of these changes and due to the fact that the university as a whole was beginning to plan a CQI initiative, it was decided to go ahead and launch a continuous improvement program in the MET Department. It was felt that the department was due for a major review and could substantially benefit from a formal continuous improvement program. The next ABET visit to the MET Department at Purdue is scheduled for Fall 1998. Because the planning and documentation for such a visit normally span at least an entire academic year, it was felt that prompt action was necessary. Therefore, after some preliminary planning, continuous improvement activities were launched in the Summer of 1994. The progress to date is described below. MET Department Initiatives Formation of the Continuous Improvement Committee (CIC) In a university setting, one of the first things that happens when new ideas or initiatives are launched is the formation of a committee. This was also true in the case of CQI. Even though it P ge 214.2 3 was realized that CQI must involve every individual in the department including faculty, staff, and administration, it was determined that a focused group would serve as the hub of activities initiated. This group would be responsible to record and maintain the documentation of efforts for later inspections by TAC of ABET or other assessment teams. It is important to note that the new TAC of ABET criteria (V.A.4.) include a requirement for evidence which demonstrates continuous improvement results. The committee would also be responsible to monitor all accreditation agency requirements and CQI expectations of the university and to disseminate this information to faculty and staff. The committee was appointed in May 1994. It originally consisted of a chair and three members; one for curriculum, one for facilities, and one for processes. Later, a fourth member, representing student activities, was added. The committee has met almost monthly since its formation and has served as a true catalyst to move the department’s CQI program into a proactive stance. Meeting minutes are kept as well as other documentation of committee efforts so that specific improvements can be gauged. University Wide North Central Assessment Effort The university’s next accreditation visit by the North Central Association (NCA) takes place in the year 2000 and, as a result, there has been a university level effort to establish a plan meeting the NCA requirements. To this end, representatives from each school were selected to form a task force with the job of guiding this effort. The School of Technology representative also facilitates a school level committee made up of representatives from each department of the school. The North Central Assessment Committee, as the school level committee is known, has met regularly throughout the school year. An important ongoing effort of this committee has been to facilitate communication between departments and share information about assessment or other improvement projects being developed. For example, the MET representative has provided the school committee with a copy of a planning calendar and an example of a learning outcome model (see Specific Department Efforts below). Each department should be able to learn from the success or failures of the other departments. This committee serves as a vehicle for this exchange of information. One additional project that the committee has undertaken is to revise a school wide survey to use in assessing our success in education as viewed by employers, alumni, and faculty. Purdue University’s Excellence-21 Campaign During the Fall 1995 semester, the Purdue University president assembled 140 representatives of every Purdue School, administrative unit, and campus to launch Excellence-21, an initiative to apply continuous improvement techniques throughout the university. The two-day leadership conference featured seminars on how to apply CQI tools and techniques in a university setting. The conference also featured success stories of several examples of how Purdue units had improved performance in the past through customer attention and overall redesigning of processes. Principles of customer-centered thinking were the focus of the two-day event. These principles, applied since the 1950’s in industry, were presented by Motorola Inc. Motorola is internationally known for CQI and they have joined Purdue as a partner in the Excellence-21 campaign. The P ge 214.3 4 two-day conference was followed by a year long implementation phase, where the principles were disseminated and applied to all facets of the university’s operation. Each unit on campus was responsible to define, implement, and report on at least two CQI initiatives during the 1996 calendar year. For academic units, at least one of the projec