T Ips For Greasing The Tenure Track 3

Utilizing knowledge gained from participation in NSF’s New Century Scholars (NCS) Workshop at Stanford University as both a scholar (1999) and subsequently a senior scholar (2000), best practices for new engineering faculty are identified based upon the author’s four years of personal experience in academia. This third paper in the series, all by NCS senior scholars, provides the perspective of an engineering educator at small, private, undergraduate engineering college in the Midwest. First, the academic environment at the author’s home institution, Tri-State University, is presented. The author then reviews his job functions as a newly promoted associate professor and department chair: teacher, mentor, administrator, and consultant. A "Top Twelve List" of best practices for new faculty, based upon personal experiences and utilizing NCS materials, is then offered. In addition, the success of incorporating a specific project-based learning activity, design and calibration of water bottle rockets, into a freshman-level introductory course is discussed. Finally, an illustration of how specific elements of the NCS Workshop have impacted the author’s teaching practices is presented. These elements include: • knowledge of learning styles • use of formal and informal student course evaluations to improve teaching • setting goals to achieve important, not urgent, objectives in life These elements are tangible suggestions for new (and more experienced) engineering educators to take back to the classroom and try for themselves.