pacific nw transportation consortium region 10 Pactrans

Investigators: PI Kevin Chang (UI), Co-PI Shane Brown (OSU), Co-PI Robert Perkins (UAF), Co-PI Linda Boyle (UW), Co-PI William Cofer (WSU)

Project Type: Multi-Institution Project

Title of Original Research: Refinement and Dissemination of a digital platform for sharing transportation education materials

Research Description: There are approximately two hundred Introduction to Transportation Engineering courses taught annually in the United States but little evidence to suggest that teaching materials (other than textbooks) are being shared between the instructors of these courses. The National Science Foundation (NSF) spends millions of dollars annually through the Transforming Undergraduate Education in STEM (TUES) program on the development and testing of teaching methods and materials. Conversations with NSF program managers indicate that they are disappointed with the rate of return on this investment, and would like to see much less development and much more sharing and dissemination of best practices. New NSF programs are emerging specifically on utilizing best practices and understanding the adoption process.

Several years ago PacTrans funded a two-year, Multi-Institutional project, bringing together researchers from each of the five Universities in the PacTrans Consortium to address this issue. During the initial phase of this project, the research team developed a framework for a prototype website, the PacTrans Transportation Education Resource Center (pTERC), for sharing transportation curriculum and best practices.

Technology Transfer: PacTrans has since awarded additional funds to this group of researchers to complete the technology transfer process. This process will include the creation of the website explored in the research.