An honors program for freshman engineering students: development and long term evaluation

Summary form only given. In 1993, under funding provided by the NSF Gateway Engineering Education program, The Ohio State University College of Engineering (Department of Engineering Graphics) initiated an innovative freshman program with an emphasis on hands-on labs, teamwork, and concentrated design-build projects. This program was adapted from the Drexel E4 program that was developed under an earlier NSF curriculum grant and from other Gateway schools. The program is now a permanent part of the College, and is serving as a recruiting tool for highly talented students. Since its inception, the program has maintained an ongoing database of student characteristics and academic performance. Each participating group has been matched to a nonparticipating control group. Now in its sixth academic year, the program has a solid track record of positive results in retention, reducing time to major, grade point average, and co-op/internship participation. The College has the ability to analyze level of participation in the program, in co-op and internships, in industry and/or graduate school, as well as extra-curricular participation and graduation rates (i.e., time to graduate). Norm referenced data has also been collected to compare student performance with students at other major engineering institutions. This paper describes the program components developed by faculty and graduate students in Engineering, Physics, and Math, plus the results of assessment and longitudinal tracking.