A RUBRICS-BASED METHODOLOGICAL APPROACH FOR EVALUATING THE DESIGN COMPETENCY OF ENGINEERING STUDENTS

In this research, an evaluation roadmap is developed using rubrics to provide instructors with guidance in clarifying expectations to students for maximum grade results, while providing themselves with a “three-dimensional” methodological approach for evaluating and ranking students’ competency in design engineering. The efforts were focused on developing a model to evaluate the extent to which students have applied their knowledge in various design engineering projects over their undergraduate education. More specifically, a multidimensional rubric was developed to accommodate the levels at which students are taught the concepts required for their design projects; that is, how well are students understanding a topic when they are first introduced to it, when they are taught it at an intermediate level, or when advanced learning is expected. The obtained results include comprehensive rubrics that have proven their practical usefulness as roadmaps for evaluating the learning process and the acquired design competency of engineering students and methods can be developed to customize them.