Clemson University TigerPrints All Dissertations Dissertations 12-2012 A PROCESS ANALYSIS OF ENGINEERING PROBLEM SOLVING AND ASSESSMENT OF PROBLEM SOLVING SKILLS Sarah Grigg Clemson University,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_dissertations Part of the Industrial Engineering Commons Recommended Citation Grigg, Sarah, "A PROCESS ANALYSIS OF ENGINEERING PROBLEM SOLVING AND ASSESSMENT OF PROBLEM SOLVING SKILLS" (2012). All Dissertations. 1012. https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/all_dissertations/1012 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Dissertations at TigerPrints. It has been accepted for inclusion in All Dissertations by an authorized administrator of TigerPrints. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. A PROCESS ANALYSIS OF ENGINEERING PROBLEM SOLVING AND ASSESSMENT OF PROBLEM SOLVING SKILLS A Dissertation Presented to the Graduate School of Clemson University In Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctorate of Philosophy Industrial Engineering by Sarah J. Grigg December 2012 Accepted by: Dr. Anand Gramopadhye, Committee Chair Dr. Lisa Benson Dr. Joel Greenstein Dr. Sandra Garrett ABSTRACT In the engineering profession, one of the most critical skills to possess is accurate and efficient problem solving. Thus, engineering educators should strive to help students develop skills needed to become competent problem solvers. In order to measure the development of skills, it is necessary to assess student performance, identify any deficiencies present in problem solving attempts, and identify trends in performance over time. Through iterative assessment using standard assessment metrics, researchers/instructors are able to track trends in problem solving performance across time, which can serve as a gauge of students’ learning gains.