Exploration and practice of the CDIO engineering education reform control system

With the goal of cultivating talent, CDIO engineering education reform is a system engineering program that needs to be improved and perfected. Adopting the idea of control theory, the CDIO engineering education reform can be designed and implemented effectively by establishing the control system of CDIO engineering education reform.

Based on the analysis on the 12 CDIO Standards, a control system of CDIO Standards, which consists of three interrelated control systems (courses, curriculum system and cultivating mode) is established in this paper.

Course control system is the innermost layer, which consists of the modules of course teaching and learning and enviromental conditions. The module of course teaching and learning includes integrated learning experiences (Standard 7), active learning (Standard 8), and learning assessment (Standard 11). The module of enviromental conditions consists of two parts, which are teacher development and learning environment. Teacher development includes enhancement of faculty competence (Standard 9) and enhancement of faculty teaching competence (Standard 10). Learning environment includes engineering workspaces (Standard 6).

Curriculum control system, which is the outer layer of the course control system, consists of the course control system, the modules of curriculum system, learning outcoms, and evaluative feedback. The module of curriculum system includes integrated curriculum (Standard 3), introduction to engineering (Standard 4), and design-implement experences (Standard 5). The module of learning outcomes includes Standard 2. The module of evaluative feedback includes program evaluation (Standard 12).

The outer layer of the curriculum control system is the cultivating mode control system, which consists of the curriculum control system and the modules of college orientation and evaluative feedback. The module of college orientation, which includes the context (Standard 1), standardizes the educational concept, missions, and professional goals of the college, etc.

The keys to ensure the effective operation of a control system are the three elements of control target, control mode, and implementation effect. Based on the three elements, a feedback control model of analysis, implementation, constraints, and evaluation for the control system of CDIO Standards is established in this paper.

In the cultivating mode control system, specialty education objectives are identified according to industry requirements, student growth requirements, and college orientation. Based on the specialty education objectives, specialty cultivative criteria are formulated. And by using the methods of tracking evalution of the graduate employment, evaluation of employers, professional certification, and evaluation of the education administrative department, feedbacks of social demand are obtained, which further promote the cultivative mode education reform.

In the curriculum control system, based on CDIO syllabus and specialty education objectives, first-level standards are formulated. Then, by associating the first-level standards with courses, goals for course teaching are definited. The curriculum realization matrix (called first-level realization matrix) is thus defined by taking first-level standards as columns, courses (implementation approaches) as rows and learning outcome (teaching effect) of course as the value of matrix. The implementation effect of the curriculum system can be observed through the evalutions of the graduates, teachers, experts, and employers. Thus the control model of curriculum education reform is established to further promote the curriculum education reform.

In the course control system, according to the first-level standards, second-level standards of cultivative standards are formulated. Then, by associating the second-level standards with the course teaching programs and methods, goals for course teaching programs and methods are definited. The course realization matrix (called second-level realization matrix) is then defined by taking second-level standards as columns, course teaching programs and methods as rows and learning outcome (teaching effect) of course teaching programs and methods as the value of matrix. The teaching effect of the course can be observed throuth the evalutions of the students, teachers, and experts. Thus the control model of course education reform is established to further promote the course education reform.

The whole control system takes the realization matrixes as the basic variables. There are seventeen realization matrixes of six categories, which are target matrixes A, realization matrixes R, outcome matrixes C, evalution matrixes P, deviation matrixes E, and evalutions deference matrixes D. A combination of qualitative and quantitative system analysis and implementation method for CDIO engineering education reform is proposed.

The CDIO engineering education reform control system is used in our college. Taking the ability standards as the cultivating standards, the two-level matrix method is used to integrate curriculum system and promote the teaching reform. The three-stage cooperation education of campus curriculum, university-enterprise cooperation curriculum, and enterprise practice is implemented. Thus the exploration practice of ability oriented engineering applied talents training mode ("one main line, two levels of matrix, a three-stage cooperative education") has obtained a good result.

Proceedings of the 10th International CDIO Conference, Barcelona, Spain, June 15-19 2014