Applying a methodology based on personal welfare to the Final Year Engineering Project

Engineering curricula include the execution of a Final Year Project (FYP) at the end of the training process. Unfortunately, several studies show that the FYP has a very high non-completion rate. In order to motivate the students to finish their FYP on time, this paper presents an efficient methodology applied to FYP guidance. Our methodology, based on the use of a portfolio, is able to improve the personal welfare of the students, help the students-tutors to plan their periodic meetings and finally to support an outcome-based assessment throughout the process. The proposed methodology was implemented in a web-based tool, over the Sakai virtual campus. In order to compare our methodology with the traditional one, a control group of 40 students and 11 teachers was chosen. The experimental results have shown that a high percentage of students who used the portfolio finished their FYPs within the time envisaged in the curricula plan. Likewise, they obtained higher marks on the majority of evaluated skills and planned their leisure time better.