Contribution: This article details the potential impacts of a curricular revision at a four-year institution on electrical and computer engineering (ECE) vertical transfer students using Heileman et al. ’s curricular complexity framework. Background: The curriculum refresh was prompted by a National Science Foundation funded program called “Revolutionizing Engineering Departments”—encouraging departments to radically shift their curricula and cultures such that it is not possible to complete a one-to-one mapping between the former curriculum and new curriculum. The purpose of the study was to examine the extent to which transfer students could integrate into the new curriculum. Research Questions: This article addresses the following research question, “how did the structural complexities of the transfer student pathways into the ECE degree programs change from their previous iterations?” Methodology: Plans of the study were collected from 12 community colleges that had articulated pathways into ECE bachelor’s degree programs ( $n = 24$ plans of study) at a four-year institution and aligned those plans with the university pathways both before and after the radical curricular change. The complexities of transfer degree pathways of the old and new curriculum were compared using Heileman et al.’s structural complexity metric. Findings: All transfer pathways in ECE increased in complexity by 84% on average. We found Computer Engineering to be a much less supported transfer pathway throughout the state’s community college system compared to Electrical Engineering. Moreover, we found considerable variation in the community college system, raising concerns of consistency across partnerships in the state’s system. Other programs can adopt the approach presented here to evaluate the complexity of their curricula.

中文翻译：

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大规模程序变更对电气和计算机工程专业转学生途径的影响

贡献： 本文详细介绍了四年制课程修订对使用Heileman的电气和计算机工程（ECE）垂直转学学生的潜在影响 等。 的课程复杂性框架。 背景：国家科学基金会资助的一项名为“革命工程系”的计划推动了课程的更新，该计划鼓励各部门从根本上改变其课程和文化，从而不可能完成旧课程与新课程之间的一对一映射。 。这项研究的目的是研究转移学生可以融入新课程的程度。研究问题： 本文解决了以下研究问题：“转入ECE学位课程的转学生途径的结构复杂性与之前的迭代方式相比有何变化？” 方法： 这项研究计划是从12所社区大学收集的，这些大学明确提出了进入ECE学士学位课程的途径（ $ n = 24 $ 学习计划），并在四年制的机构中进行，并在课程改革发生之前和之后将这些计划与大学的学习路径保持一致。使用Heileman等人的结构复杂性度量标准，比较了新旧课程的转移学位途径的复杂性。发现：欧洲经委会的所有转移途径的复杂性平均提高了84％。与电气工程相比，我们发现计算机工程是整个州立社区大学系统中受支持较少的转移途径。此外，我们发现社区大学系统存在很大差异，从而引发了对州系统中各合作伙伴之间一致性问题的担忧。其他程序可以采用此处介绍的方法来评估其课程的复杂性。