Assessing institutionalization: indicators of lasting reform [engineering education]

Although funding and accrediting agencies often want schools of engineering to provide evidence that recent reforms will endure, institutionalization is typically assessed superficially-if at all. Penn State´s Center for the Study of Higher Education (CSHE) developed indicators to assess predictors of institutionalization of curricular reforms initiated by the Engineering Coalition of Schools for Excellence in Education and Leadership (ECSEL). This article defines regulative, normative, and cognitive indicators of institutionalization, describes how they were derived from interview data, and illustrates the institutionalization indicator measures CSHE has developed to assess the likelihood that ECSEL curricular reforms will endure after NSF funding for the coalition is complete. The article illustrates how others might use the indicators to assess institutionalization of reforms at their own schools.